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was sitting at the desk, pecking at her machine while Gaffaney’s sternly enunciated words issued from a wall speaker above her head.

“. . . and legal counsel is present. Before we begin this interview, Mr. Bergen, do you have anything you wish to say?”

Lloyd pulled up a chair and smiled at the stenographer, who put a finger to her lips and pointed to the speaker just as a burst of electronically amplified laughter hit the room, followed by Marty Bergen’s voice. “Yeah. I wish to go on the record as saying that your tie clasp sucks. If the L.A.P.D. were a just bureaucracy, you would be indicted on five counts of aesthetic bankruptcy, possession of fascist regalia, and general low class. Proceed with your interview, Captain.”

Gaffaney cleared his throat. “Thank you for that unsolicited comment, Mr. Bergen. Proceeding, I will state some specific facts. You may formally object if you consider my facts erroneous. One, you are Martin D. Bergen, age forty-four. You were dismissed from the Los Angeles Police Department after sixteen years of service. While on the Department, you became friends with Officer Jacob M. Herzog, currently missing. Are these facts correct?”

“Yes,” Bergen said.

“Good. Again proceeding, six days ago you were questioned by an L.A.P.D. detective as to the current whereabouts of Officer Herzog. You told the officer that you had not seen Herzog in approximately a month, and that on the occasions of your last meetings Herzog had been ‘moody.’

Is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“Again proceeding, do you wish to alter your statement to that officer in any way?”

Bergen’s voice was a cold whisper. “Yes, I do. Jack Herzog is dead. He killed himself with an overdose of barbiturates. I discovered his body at his apartment along with a suicide note. I buried him in a rock quarry up near San Berdoo.”

Lloyd heard Bergen’s attorney gasp and begin jabbering words of caution at her client. Bergen shouted, “No, goddamn it, I want to tell it!” There was a crescendo of voices, with Gaffaney’s finally predominating: “Do you remember where you buried the body?”

“Yes,” Bergen said. “I’ll take you there, if you like.”

The speaker went silent, then slowly came to life with the sound of animated whispers. Finally Gaffaney said, “Not wanting to put words in your 378

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mouth, Mr. Bergen, would you say that the previous statement you made to the police regarding Officer Herzog was misleading or incorrect?”

“What I told Hopkins was pure bullshit,” Bergen said. “When I talked to him Jack was already three weeks in his grave. You see, I thought I could walk from all this. Then it started eating at me. I went on a drunk to sort it out. If those cops hadn’t found me I would have come forward before too long. This has got to be heavy shit that Jack was involved in, or you wouldn’t have put out an A.P.B. on me. I figure that you’ve got me for two misdemeanors—some jive charge for disposing of Jack’s body and receiving stolen documents. So just ask your questions or let me make my statement, so I can get charged and make bail. Okay, Fred baby?”

There was another long silence, this one broken by Fred Gaffaney. “Talk, Bergen. I’ll interject questions if I find them necessary.”

Breath noise filled the speaker. Lloyd’s body clenched in anticipation. Just when he thought he would snap from tension, Bergen said, “Jack was always stretched very thin, because he didn’t have the outlets that other cops have. He didn’t booze or carouse or chase pussy; he just read and brooded and competed with himself, wanting to be like these warrior mystics he worshipped. He got on mental kicks and ran wild with them. For about six months prior to his death he was obsessed with this notion of exonerating me by creating this L.A.P.D. credibility gap—showing the Department in a bad light so that the shame of my dismissal would be diminished by comparison. He talked it up and talked it up and talked it up, because he was a hero, and since he loved me he had to turn me from a coward into a hero to make our friendship real.

“About this time he met some guy in a bar. The guy introduced him to another guy, a guy that Jack called a ‘file-happy genius.’ This guy was some kind of guru who charged big bucks to all these sad guru-worshipper types, helping them with their problems and so forth. He convinced Jack to steal some personnel files that would suit their individual purposes—Jack’s ‘credibility gap’ and the guru’s loony hunger for confidential information. Jack showed me the files. Four of them were brass working outside security gigs where more personnel files were involved, one was Johnny Rolando, the TV guy, and the other was, you know, Lloyd Hopkins. Jack figured that the information in these files would comprise a sleazy picture of the L.A.P.D. and satisfy the guru’s needs.”

“Do you still have the files?” Gaffaney asked.

“No,” Bergen said. “I read them and gave them back to Jack. I tried to