Copp In The Dark, A Joe Copp Thriller (Joe Copp Private Eye Series) (23 page)

So
Vin
sent
Alfie
to Jimmy and Jimmy sent him to Judith who did not need a twisted arm to go for the guy. Meanwhile
Vin's
long arm had reached through San Francisco to make an offer that Greg Houston, already cast in
La
Mancha
, could not refuse—and the blocks all slipped neatly into place.

Pursuing his double game,
Alfie
then reported his new position to the FBI who already were watching the trial very closely. The FBI instructed
Alfie
to hang in there and stay in touch and he did so, biding his time and alert to any and all developments that could be turned to his own advantage.

I believe the first development came when he finally succeeded in coming face to face with the judge. Something sparked there and
Alfie
knew it, he pursued it, and
Alfie
and the judge became an item, undercover of course. Love, you know, can cloud the mind—and homosexual love is no
different
in that regard. This guy
Alfie
was not only a gifted actor, he was a gifted con man too, so maybe he could convince a love-smitten judge that he would never betray him even though the judge had known up front that
Alfie
worked for
DiCenza
.

The judge became nervous about
Alfie
coming regularly to his condo, though, so he gave
Alfie
money to rent an apartment convenient to
Alfie
, and the judge began going to
Alfie
in disguise, dressed in drag—and maybe that was even a lot of fun for both of them. But note the twist on names again:
Alfie
rented the apartment in the name of the judge's dead wife. I talked to
Lunceford
about this
doubleplay
name business and maybe he had an insight there.
Lunceford
told me he thought
Alfie
hung his own name on
Lunceford
because he was afraid of dying incognito and no one would have known that he'd lived and died. A violent death would have brought the truth out with the real name
closeby
. I don't know. Myself, I think the guy just loved to play those kind of games and couldn't resist macabre little touches.

It was a perfect situation for the compulsive con man, though, and he of course was looking for ways to exploit it.

But then the judge got even more nervous about
Alfie
, checked him out, probably discovered then—to his horror—that
Alfie
had ties not only to the mob but to the FBI as well.

Enter, then, Dobbs and Harney, under instructions from the judge to protect his daughter and also to learn all they could about
Alfie's
true role and connections—and that was a dangerous game for the judge in itself, shows you how desperate the guy had become.

The rest was almost inevitable, certainly predictable.

The judge probably passed word to
DiCenza
that
Alfie
was on the FBI payroll and demanded that either
DiCenza
extract
Alfie
from the equation or their deal was off.
Vin
obviously did not know of the homosexual relationship

between the two and he probably figured that he had all he needed out of
Alfie
anyway—so he ordered him hit.

Meanwhile
Alfie
had been forging ahead with his own mad scheme. He'd convinced Dobbs and Harney that he'd been assigned by the FBI to keep an eye on Judith White and that was his only involvement. But he hinted also that someone else in the cast was working for the mob, and he had these two hardened lawmen chasing their own tails around; God knows how many "
disinformational
spins" he had those guys in before they got to me.

They got to me through
Alfie
too, of course, but not by his design. They got to me by merely watching
Alfie
and his co-conspirators.
Alfie
was setting up a blackmail scheme, intending to bleed the judge for everything he had, and he'd conned the kids from
La
Mancha
to assist him in that by leading them to believe that he would use the money to bankroll them all into
bigtime
theater.

Sanchez, Stein and Peterson were central to that scheme. These guys were into every kink in the sexual repertoire and had absolutely no qualms about setting any stage under
Alfie's
direction. The idea, I think, was for the judge to meet
Alfie
as usual at the blind apartment—maybe under the pretext of talking things out and making amends, whatever—and then
Alfie
was to lure the judge to the other apartment where the trap would be sprung under the watchful eye of a video camera and with a P.I. right next door ready to enter on cue and bear witness to the compromising scene. I believe he was setting the judge up for a homosexual orgy, all on tape and certainly destructive to everything the judge held dear. Don't know why he thought he needed me for that except as a melodramatic touch designed to really scare the judge, and I still have not made up my mind as to why he sent someone to my gym to get a nude picture of me. Maybe he'd intended a bit of blackmail against me too, just to keep me in line and cooperative.

Maybe it would have worked and maybe not, but obviously
Alfie
was confident enough in his attraction to the judge to feel that it would work. But something went terribly awry with the plan—I think possibly due to the marshals' activities, partly to mine, partly to
DiCenza's
, and partly to blind fate.

Instead of the judge showing up at the blind apartment,
DiCenza's
hitman
took his place. This may have been by design. Whatever, the
hitman
killed
Alfie
and made it look like a sex crime. Maybe the nude photo of me had been there under the sofa cushion for awhile and just happened to play that way—or maybe the
hitman
found it in the apartment and used it as another set for the
sexcrime
angle. Whatever and however, Elaine became confused and delivered me to the wrong apartment—I believe she'd been there before and had a key—where we both discovered the crime but more to Elaine's consternation than mine. I've found no record of a marriage between her and
Alfie
; I think it was pure fluff.

I don't know how Dobbs and Harney got onto Elaine but after all they are professionals, maybe they had my house staked out, anyway they snatched her and grilled ha* and she took them back to the trap apartment. We know that because it's on the tape. Those guys kicked their way in there and probably had a field day with those kids— maybe not exactly with mayhem in mind but intending only to inflict pain and fear in the search for truth.

A thing like that can easily get out of hand and someone, maybe Elaine, died in the process—and with that the die was cast for the rest of them. I think the marshals panicked and left there in a hell of a mental state after covering up the first perhaps accidental death with three more on purpose and intended to look just the way it did look. Panicky, yeah, and that's why they missed the video- cassette—and that is why they missed Susan Baker. She'd gone over there to find out why I hadn't shown, was in the bathroom when Dobbs and Harney arrived, and spent the entire time hiding in a bedroom closet of that blood- spattered apartment, heard the whole gruesome encounter, ventured out only after all became quiet and spent the balance of the night pacing the floor in her own apartment, trying to contact
Alfie
and wondering what to do.

Judge White killed Art
Lahey
, sure.

He'd gone to the theater that night to see Judith, very concerned about the murders and probably feeling very threatened, probably intended to tell her the truth about his relationship with
Alfie
and beg not only her understanding but also her support in case things went sour for him. But Art
Lahey
and I were standing outside on the patio engrossed in conversation when he arrived; maybe he knew who one or both of us were and maybe he just overheard enough to know that the thing was falling apart. Remember the little old lady who asked me if
Lahey
and I were discussing the next play? Maybe someone else was listening, too, and maybe that someone panicked and followed
Lahey
out to his car, slugged him, then put
Lahey's
revolver in his mouth and pulled the trigger.

The judge probably left in a panic after that, drove around or killed time somewhere trying to figure out what to do next, called Judith and asked her to meet him after

the show. Judith was very protective of her father, knew that something was wrong, didn't want me involved in it, no way. I don't believe he told her the whole story but maybe enough to make her wonder after she learned of
Lahey's
death.

She tried to drown the wonder in sex with me but it wouldn't hold, so later that night she went to see him, had it out with him, maybe learned the whole truth. And I think that is when the judge sucked up his own gun barrel.

Well, it's always good to come up into the light, even if what you see there is not exactly pretty.

There was some talk early on about a mistrial in the
DiCenza
case but I guess there will not be one. Another judge has been assigned and there has been a continuance of the sentencing phase. All the smart money now is saying that there will be no deal and that
Vin
will die in jail. That's okay with me, of course, everyone dies somewhere and a guy like
Vin
DiCenza
was made for prison bars—and I guess it’ll be okay, too, for a lot of nervous politicians who no doubt will go right on, now, enriching themselves at the public troughs.

I've heard no seamy scandals on Judge White yet, but of course there is endless speculation about his reasons for murdering a police officer and I guess the rest can't be far behind, the usual stories in the sensational press about murder conspiracies and hints that all was not clean in the judge's past. Actually it's already starting. A local TV station did a news feature the other day on the federal court system and judicial abuses, obviously trying to link Judge White's suicide with a recent spate of senate impeachments of federal judges back east somewhere.

See, these guys are not gods, they're not even perfect human beings, and at the bottom line they are politicians— so what can you expect of an inverse system? You can pay them what they're worth, show them the proper respect, and watch them like hawks—then hope that the cream will find its proper place at the top of the bottle. What else can you do?

Dobbs and Harney are back in jail and the San Bernardino prosecutor is re-examining the evidence against them in the "unsolved" murders of Elaine Somoza, Jesus Sanchez, James Peterson and Peter Stein. I believe they'll take the fall like men, cop a plea on extenuating circumstances, and hope for a softhearted judge. They could even draw one count of involuntary manslaughter and three of second-degree murder, and maybe they'll get off with seven to ten in the slammer and an early parole. I'm due to go in tomorrow and give a deposition, and you already know what I'm going to say to the prosecutor.

Art
Lahey's
death has been officially upgraded to "line of duty" status, and that's good for his family. The good do sometimes die young, you know, but how do we know for sure that death is always a sort of punishment?—maybe sometimes it's a reward for good behavior, an early release like parole from the troubles of earth, a return with honors to the bliss of dreamtime. I'd buy that idea, for guys like Art
Lahey
.

Susan Baker has already told her story to the prosecutor and she's working something out that will allow her to go to Japan next month with a show—following her karma, I guess, still in pursuit of the unreachable star. Maybe she’ll even find it between her thighs, where she's been looking all the while anyway.

Lunceford
told me that he's abandoning the dream. He's very young and feeling very heavily the burdens of family responsibilities, and his father-in-law wants to take him into his general contracting business but it involves travel so he’ll have to give up the theater, and he says that is what he is going to do. Way I see it, that doesn't have to mean the end of dreams. What is wrong with wanting to be the best damned builder in the country, or the best plumber or carpenter or shopkeeper? Dreams can be anywhere the lifeline takes us; maybe we shouldn't try to narrow it down so much.

Justice Johansen came in from Minnesota a couple of days ago to take his boy home. Tried to give me some more money but he’ll he probably needs it more than I do and I did nothing to earn it. Told me that he'd never had an inkling that
Alfie
wanted to study drama. He'd hoped that his son would want to go to law school and was very surprised when
Alfie
opted for chemical engineering—said he wouldn't have objected to him studying theater arts, so it's a strange world. I didn't tell the judge anything about
Alfie's
ignoble pursuits. He thinks his kid was killed in the line of undercover duty with the FBI, so he’ll have to learn otherwise from someone other than me.