Lost Light

never even got to me. Not that I would have accepted the request if I had seen it. I had an arrogance then that I hoped I had now lost.
    I scanned the interviews and summaries as fast as I could, paying particular attention to the reports pertaining to the three bank employees I hoped to talk to later in the day, Gordon Scaggs, Linus Simonson and Jocelyn Jones. The subjects did not give Szatmari much. Scaggs was the one who handled everything and he was very specific as to the steps he had taken and the planning of the one-day loan of $2 million in cash. The interviews with Simonson and Jones depicted them as worker bees who did what they were told. They could have just as easily been putting labels on cans as counting twenty thousand hundred-dollar bills and writing down eight hundred serial numbers while they were at it.
    My curiosity meter jumped when I came across documents pertaining to the financial backgrounds of Jack Dorsey, Lawton Cross and myself. Szatmari had pulled TRW reports on all of us. He had apparently called our banks and credit-card companies. He wrote short summaries on each of us, my record coming out cleanest, while Cross and Dorsey did not fare as well. According to Szatmari, both men carried huge credit-card debt, with Dorsey in the most difficult financial position because he was divorced but still supporting four children, two of whom were in college.
    The door to the office opened and the secretary looked in, just about to say something to Szatmari when she saw it was me behind his desk.
    “What are you doing?”
    “Waiting for Mr. Szatmari. He went to get a coffee.”
    She put her hands on her ample hips, the international sign of indignation.
    “Did he tell you to go behind his desk and start reading that file?”
    It was incumbent upon me not to leave Szatmari in a potential jam.
    “He told me to wait. I’m waiting.”
    “Well, you get right back around to the other side of that desk. I’ll be informing Mr. Szatmari about what I saw.”
    I closed the file, got up and came around the desk as instructed.
    “You know, I’d really appreciate it if you didn’t do that,” I said.
    “I don’t care what you’d appreciate, I’m telling him.”
    She then disappeared, leaving the door open in her wake. A few minutes went by and Szatmari stormed in and closed the door sharply. He then lost his anger as he turned to face me. He was carrying a coffee mug with steam rising out of it.
    “Thanks for playing it that way,” he said. “I just hope you got whatever you needed because now to make good on the little fit I had out there I have to throw you out.”
    “No problem,” I said, standing up. “I’ve got one question, though.”
    “Go ahead.”
    “Was that just routine to do the background financials on the cops on the case? Me, Jack Dorsey and Lawton Cross.”
    Szatmari folded his brow as he tried to remember the reason for the financial checks. Then he shrugged.
    “I forgot about that. I think I just thought that with the money that was at stake I should check everybody out. Especially you, Bosch, with the coincidence of you being there at the set at the right moment.”
    I nodded. It sounded like a solid investigative move.
    “Are you angry about it?”
    “Me? No, not mad. I was just curious about where it came from, that’s all.”
    “Anything else helpful?”
    “Maybe, you never know.”
    “Good luck then. If you don’t mind, keep me informed of any progress.”
    “I will. I’ll let you know.”
    We shook hands. On my way out I passed by the indignant secretary and told her to have a nice day. She didn’t respond.

33
    The interview with Gordon Scaggs went quickly and smoothly. He met me at the agreed-upon time at the BankLA tower in downtown. His forty-second-floor office faced east and had one of the best views of the city’s smog I had ever seen. His recounting of his involvement in the ill-fated $2 million loan to Eidolon Productions deviated in no noticeable way from his statement in the murder book. He negotiated a $50,000 fee for the bank, the costs of security included. The money was to go out in the morning on the day of filming and come back before 6 P.M. closing time.
    “I knew there was a risk,” Scaggs told me. “But I saw a nice, quick profit for the bank. I guess you could say that clouded my vision.”
    Scaggs turned the money transport issues over to Ray Vaughn, head of bank security, while he turned his attention to the chores of insuring