The Last Coyote

Florida,” Bosch repeated.
    He had no idea there was a Venice in Florida.
    “It’s a state, over on the other side of the country.”
    “I know where it is.”
    “Oh, and one other thing. The address I have is only a P.O. box. Sorry about that.”
    “Yeah, I bet. What about a phone?”
    She tossed the wet napkins into a trash can in the corner of the room.
    “We have no phone number. Try information.”
    “I will. Does it say there when he retired?”
    “You didn’t ask me to get that.”
    “Then give me what you’ve got.”
    Bosch knew he could get more, that they’d have to have a phone number somewhere, but he was handicapped because this was an unauthorized investigation. If he pushed things too far, then he’d only succeed in having his activities discovered and then halted.
    She floated the paper across the desk to him. He looked at it. It had two addresses on it, the P.O. box for McKittrick and the street address in Las Vegas for Eno’s widow. Her name was Olive.
    Bosch thought of something.
    “When do the checks go out?”
    “Funny you should ask.”
    “Why?”
    “Because today’s the last day of the month. They always go out the last day of the month.”
    That was a break and he felt like he deserved it, that he had worked for it. He picked up the paper she had given him and slipped it into his briefcase, then he stood up.
    “Always a pleasure to do work with the public servants of the city.”
    “Likewise. And, uh, Detective? Could you return the chair to the place you found it? As I said, Cassidy will need it.”
    “Of course, Mona. Pardon my forgetfulness.”

Chapter Fifteen
    A FTER THE BOUT with bureaucratic claustrophobia, Bosch decided he needed some air to recover. He took the elevator down to the lobby and out the main doors to Spring Street. As he walked out, he was directed by a security officer to walk down the right side of the wide-staired entrance to the great building because there was a film location shoot taking place on the left side. Bosch watched what they were doing as he stepped down the stairs and then decided to take a break and have a smoke.
    He sat down on one of the concrete sidings along the stairs and lit a cigarette. The film shoot involved a group of actors posing as reporters who rushed down the stairs of City Hall to meet and question two men getting out of a car at the curb. They rehearsed it twice and then shot it twice while Bosch sat there and smoked two cigarettes. Each time, the reporters all yelled the same thing at the two men.
    “Mr. Barrs, Mr. Barrs, did you do it? Did you do it?”
    The two men refused to answer and pushed through the pack and up the stairs with the reporters backtracking. On one of the takes one of the reporters stumbled as he moved backwards, fell on his back on the stairs and was partially trampled by the others. The director kept the scene going, perhaps thinking that the fall added a touch of realism to the scene.
    Bosch figured that the filmmakers were using the steps and front facade of City Hall as a courthouse setting. The men coming from the car were the defendant and his high-priced lawyer. He knew that City Hall was frequently used for such shots because it actually looked more like a courthouse than any real courthouse in the city.
    Bosch was bored after the second take, though he guessed there would be many more. He got up and walked down to First and then over to Los Angeles Street. He took that back to Parker Center. Along the way he was asked for spare change only four times, which he thought was a low count for downtown and possibly a sign of improving economic times. In the lobby of the police building he passed the bank of pay phones and on a whim stopped, picked one of the phones off the hook and dialed 305-555-1212. He had dealt with Metro-Dade Police in Miami several times over the years and 305 was the only Florida area code that readily came to mind. When the operator came on he asked for Venice and she informed him that 813 was the proper area code.
    He then redialed and got information in Venice. First he asked the operator what the nearest large city to Venice was. She told him that was Sarasota and he asked what the nearest large city was to that. When she said St. Petersburg, he finally started getting his bearings. He knew where St. Petersburg was on a map-the west coast of Florida-because he knew the Dodgers occasionally played spring training games there and he had looked it up once.
    He