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I hung up before Crumley reached me.
“Son of a bitch,” he said, hooked.
“Two blocks, maybe three, from where you were born?”
“Four, you conniving bastard.”
“Well?” I said.
Crumley grabbed Rattigan’s book.
“Almost but not quite a Book of the Dead?” he said.
“Want to try another number?” I opened the book, turned, and stopped under the Rs. “Here’s one, oh Lord yes, even better than Queen Califia.”
Crumley squinted. “Rattigan, Mount Lowe. What kind of Rattigan lives up on Mount Lowe? That’s where the big red trolley that’s been dead half my lifetime used to take thousands up for picnics.”
Memory shadowed Crumley’s face.
I touched another name.
“Rattigan. St. Vibiana’s Cathedral.”
“What kind of Rattigan, holy jumping Jesus, hides out in St. Vibiana’s Cathedral?”
“Spoken like a born-again Catholic.” I studied Crumley’s now-permanent scowl. “Want to know? I’m on my way.”
I took three false steps before Crumley swore. “How the hell you going to get there with no license and no car?”
I kept my back turned. “You’re going to take me.”
There was a long brooding silence.
“Right?” I prompted.
“You know how in hell to find where the Mount Lowe trolley once ran?”
“I was carried up by my folks when I was eighteen months old.”
“That means you can show the way?”
“Total recall.”
“Shut up,” said Crumley as he tossed a half-dozen bottles of beer into the jalopy. “Get in the car.”
We got in, left Gershwin to punch piano-roll holes in Paris, and drove away.
“Don’t say anything,” said Crumley. “Just nod your head left, right, or straight ahead.”
Chapter Eight
“I’ll be damned if I know why in hell I’m doing this,” Crumley muttered, almost driving on the wrong side of the street. “I said, I’ll be damned if I know why in hell—”
“I heard you,” I said, watching the mountains and the foothills coming closer.
“You know who you remind me of ?” Crumley snorted. “My first and only wife, who knew how to flimflam me with her shapes and sizes and big smiles.”
“Do I flimflam you?”
