The Black Echo

witness or tape recording. One cop’s word against another’s was something they wouldn’t touch in this department. Deep down, they knew a cop’s word by itself was worthless. That was why Internal Affairs cops always worked in pairs.
    An hour and seven cigarettes later, Bosch found it. A photocopy of another Polaroid of the gold-and-jade bracelet was part of a fifty-page packet of descriptions and photos of property lost in a burglary at WestLand National Bank at Sixth and Hill. Now Bosch was able to place the address in his mind, and he remembered the dark smoked glass of the building. He had never been inside the bank. A bank heist with jewelry taken, he thought. It didn’t make much sense. He studied the list. Almost every item was a piece of jewelry and there was too much there for a walk-in robbery. Harriet Beecham alone was listed as having lost eight antique rings, four bracelets, four earrings. Besides that, these were listed as burglary losses, not robbery losses. He looked through the Be on Lookout package for any kind of crime summary, but didn’t find any. Just a bureau contact: Special Agent E. D. Wish.
    Then he noticed in a block on the BOLO sheet that there were three dates noted for the date of the crime. A burglary over a three-day span during the first week of September. Labor Day weekend, he realized. Downtown banks are closed three days. It had to have been a safe-deposit caper. A tunnel job? Bosch leaned back and thought about that. Why hadn’t he remembered it? A heist like that would have played in the media for days. It would have been talked about in the department even longer. Then he realized he had been in Mexico on Labor Day, and for the next three weeks. The bank heist had occurred while he was serving the one-month suspension for the Dollmaker case. He leaned forward, picked up a phone and dialed.
    “
Times,
Bremmer.”
    “It’s Bosch. Still got you working Sundays, huh?”
    “Two to ten, every Sunday, no parole. So, what’s up? I haven’t talked to you since, uh, your problem with the Dollmaker case. How you liking Hollywood Division?”
    “It’ll do. For a while, at least.” He was speaking low so the duty detective would not overhear.
    Bremmer said, “Like that, huh? Well, I heard you caught the stiff up at the dam this morning.”
    Joel Bremmer had covered the cop shop for the
Times
longer than most cops had been on the force, including Bosch. There was not much he didn’t hear about the department, or couldn’t find out with a phone call. A year ago he called Bosch for comment on his twenty-two-day suspension, no pay. Bremmer had heard about it before Bosch. Generally, the police department hated the
Times,
and the
Times
was never short in its criticism of the department. But in the middle of that was Bremmer, whom any cop could trust and many, like Bosch, did.
    “Yeah, that’s my case,” Bosch said. “Right now, it’s nothing much. But I need a favor. If it works out the way it’s looking, then it will be something you’d want to know about.”
    Bosch knew he didn’t have to bait him, but he wanted the reporter to know there might be something later.
    “What do you need?” Bremmer said.
    “As you know, I was out of town last Labor Day on my extended vacation, courtesy of IAD. So I missed this one. But there was-”
    “The tunnel job? You’re not going to ask about the tunnel job, are you? Over here in downtown? All the jewelry? Negotiable bonds, stock certificates, maybe drugs?”
    Bosch heard the reporter’s voice go up a notch in urgency. He had been right, it had been a tunnel and the story had played well. If Bremmer was this interested, then it was a substantial case. Still, Bosch was surprised he had not heard of it after coming back to work in October.
    “Yeah, that’s the one,” he said. “I was gone then, so I missed it. Ever any arrests?”
    “No, it’s open. FBI’s doing it, last I checked.”
    “I want to look at the clips on it tonight. Is that all right?”
    “I’ll make copies. When are you coming?”
    “I’ll head over in a little while.”
    “I take it this has got something to do with this morning’s stiff?”
    “It’s looking that way. Maybe. I can’t talk right now. And I know the feebees have the case. I’ll go see them tomorrow. That’s why I want to see the clips tonight.”
    “I’ll be here.”
    After hanging up the phone, Bosch looked down at the FBI photocopy of the bracelet. There was no doubt it