Nate ordered a latte and a bagel, taking a seat at a small empty table close enough to eavesdrop on the "artistes' table." He'd started doing it after he'd overheard them talking about pitching scripts to HBO and getting financing for small indie projects and doing lunch with a famous agent from CAA who one of them said was a schmuck-all topics of fascination to Hollywood Nate Weiss.

By now, he was almost able to recognize them from their voices without looking at them directly. There was the features director who, due to Hollywood ageism, complained that he couldn't even get arrested at the studios. Ditto for three former screenwriters who were regulars at the table, as well as for a former TV producer. A dozen or more of these would come and go, all males, the average age being seventy-plus, far too old for the youth-obsessed entertainment business that had nurtured them.

A formerly famous painter and sculptor, wearing a trademark black beret, wasn't selling so well these days either. Nate heard him tell the others that when his wife asks him what he wants for dinner, his usual response is, "Get off my back, will ya?" Then the painter added, "But don't feel sorry for us. We're getting used to living in our car."

A former TV character actor wearing a safari jacket from Banana Republic, whose face was familiar to Nate, stood up and informed the others he had to leave and make an important call to a VP in development at Universal to discuss a script he'd been deciding whether or not to accept.

After he'd gone, the director said, "The poor schlemiel. I'll bet he gets a 'Please leave a message' recording from the VP at Universal. That's who he discusses the project with-a machine. Probably has to call back a hundred and thirty-five times to get his whole pitch into the VP's voice mail."

"I've suspected he's calling the number for highway information when he pretends to be talking to HBO," the painter said, clucking sadly.

"He never was any good, even in his prime," the director said. "Thought he was a method actor. They'd run out of money doing retakes. Twenty tics a take on average."

"If he had more of a name, they could paint him like a wh.o.r.e and let him do arthritis and Geico commercials, like the rest of those has-beens," said the has-been TV producer.

"And women?" one of the screenwriters said. "He thinks we believe his daffy seduction stories. Instead of another face-lift, the old b.a.s.t.a.r.d should have his b.a.l.l.s stapled to his thigh to keep them from dropping in the toilet."

"He could do it without anesthetic," said the oldest of the screenwriters. "At his age it's a dead zone down there."

All of the geezers, who tended to talk over one another in multiple conversations, went silent for a moment when a stunning young woman paused to look into a nearby shop that sold gla.s.sware and candles. She wore a canary cotton jersey accented by hyacinth st.i.tching, and four hundred dollar second-skin jeans, and stood nearly six feet tall in her Jimmy Choo lilac suede pumps. She had a full, pouty upper lip, and b.u.t.terscotch blonde hair so luxurious it fanned across her shoulder when she turned to look at a gla.s.s figurine and then fell back perfectly into place when she continued walking. Her amazing hair gleamed when spangled sunlight pierced the covered patio and provided honey-colored highlights.

The codgers sighed and snuffled and did everything but drool before resuming their conversations. Nate watched her walk out toward the parking lot. Her remarkable body said Pilates loud and clear, and he could see she wasn't wearing a bra. There in Hollywood, and even in Beverly Hills, Nate Weiss had not seen many showstoppers like her.

By then, Nate was ready to go back to work. It was getting depressing listening to the old guys railing about ageism, knowing in their hearts they'd never work again. He'd noticed that always around 9:30 A.M. A.M., they'd get up one by one and make excuses to leave, for important calls from directors, or for appointments with agents, or to get back to scripts they were polishing. Nate figured they all just went home to sit and stare at phones that never rang. It gave him a chill to think that he might be looking at Nathan Weiss a few decades from now.

Nate strolled to the parking lot thirty yards behind the beauty with the b.u.t.terscotch hair, wanting to see what she drove. He figured her for a Beverly Hills hottie in an Aston Martin with a vanity license plate, compliments of a bucks-up husband or sugar daddy who drove a stately Rolls Phantom. It was almost disappointing when she got into a red BMW sedan instead of something really expensive and exotic.

Impulsively, he jotted down her license number, and when he got back to his black-and-white, ran a DMV check and saw that she lived in the Hollywood Hills, off Laurel Canyon Boulevard in the development called Mt. Olympus, where realtors claimed there were more Italian cypress trees per acre than anywhere else on earth. Her address surprised him a bit. There were lots of well-to-do foreign nationals on Mt. Olympus: Israelis, Iranians, Arabs, Russians, and Armenians, and others from former Soviet bloc countries, some of whom had been suspects or victims in major crimes. A few of the residents reportedly owned banks in Moscow, and it was not uncommon to see young adults driving Bentleys, and teenagers in BMWs and Porsches.

Around the LAPD it was said that mobbed-up former Soviets were more dangerous and cruel than the Sicilian gangsters ever were back in the day. Just five months earlier, two Russians had been sentenced to death in Los Angeles Superior Court for kidnapping and murder. They'd suffocated or strangled four men and one woman in a $1.2 million ransom scheme.

Mt. Olympus was pricey, all right, but not the creme de la creme of local real estate, and Nate thought that the area didn't suit her style. Luckily, it was in Hollywood Division and he'd often patrolled the streets up there. He figured it was unlikely that this Hills bunny would ever need a cop, but after finally getting his SAG card, Hollywood Nate Weiss was starting to believe that maybe anything was possible.

At 6 P.M P.M. that day, after the midwatch had cleared with communications and was just hitting the streets, and Nate Weiss was an hour from end-of-watch, the electronic beep sounded on the police radio and the PSR's voice said to a midwatch unit, "All units in the vicinity and Six-X-Seventy-six, a jumper at the northeast corner, Hollywood and Highland. Six-X-Seventy-six, handle code three."

Hollywood Nate in his patrol unit-which everyone at LAPD called their "shop" because of the identifying shop numbers on the front doors and roof-happened to be approaching the traffic light west at that intersection. He'd been gazing at the Kodak Center and dreaming of red carpets and stardom when the call came out. He saw the crowd of tourists gathering, looking up at a building twelve stories high, with an imposing green cupola. Even several of the so-called Street Characters who hustled tourists in the forecourt of Grauman's Chinese Theatre were jaywalking or running along the Walk of Fame to check out the excitement.

Superman was there, of course, and the Hulk, but not Spider-Man, who was in jail. Porky Pig waddled across the street, followed by Barney the dinosaur and three of the Beatles, the fourth staying behind to guard the karaoke equipment. Everyone was jabbering and pointing up at the top of the vacant building, formerly a bank, where a young man in walking shorts, tennis shoes, and a purple T-shirt with "Just Do It" across the front sat on the roof railing, a dozen stories above the street below.

In the responding unit were Veronica Sinclair and Catherine Song, both women in their early thirties who, as far as Nate was concerned, happened to be among the better cops on midwatch. Cat was a sultry Korean American whose hobby was volleyball and whose feline grace made her name a perfect fit. Nate, who had been trying unsuccessfully to date her for nearly a year, loved Cat's raven hair, cut in a retro bob like the girls in the 1930s movies that he had in his film collection. Cat was a divorced mother of a two-year-old boy.

Ronnie Sinclair had been at Hollywood Station for less than a year, but she'd been a heartthrob from the first moment she'd arrived. She was a high-energy brunette with a very short haircut that worked, given her small, tight ears and well-shaped head. She had pale blue eyes, great cheekbones, and a bustline that made all the male cops pretend they were admiring the shooting medals hanging on her shirt flap. The remarkable thing about her was that her childless marriages had been to two police officers named Sinclair who were distant cousins, so Flotsam and Jetsam called her Sinclair Squared. Most of the midwatch officers over the age of thirty were single but had been divorced at least once, including the surfer cops and Hollywood Nate.

The two women were met at the open door of the vacant building by an alarm company employee who said, "I don't know yet how he got in. Probably broke a window in the back. The elevator still works."

Ronnie and Cat hurried inside to the elevators, Nate right behind them. And all three stood waiting for the elevator, trying to be chatty to relieve the gathering tension.

"Why aren't you circling the station about now?" Ronnie said, looking at her watch. "You're almost end-of-watch and there must be a starlet waiting."

Nate looked at his own watch and said, "I still have, let's see, forty-seven minutes to give to the people of Los Angeles. And who needs starlets when I have such talent surrounding me?"

When Nate, whose womanizing was legendary at Hollywood Station, shot her his Groucho leer, Ronnie said, "Forget it, Nate. Ask me for a date sometime when you're a star and can introduce me to George Clooney."

That caused Hollywood Nate to whip out his badge wallet and proudly remove the SAG card tucked right underneath his police ID, holding it up for Ronnie and Cat to see.

Ronnie looked at it and said, "Even O.J. has one of those."

Cat said, "Sorry, Nate, but my mom wants me to date and marry a rich Buddhahead lawyer next time, not some oh-so-cute, round-eyed actor like you."

"Someday you'll both want me to autograph an eight-by-ten head shot for you," Nate said, pleased that Cat thought he was cute, more pleased that she'd called him an actor. "Then I'll be the one playing hard to get."

During the ride up in the elevator they didn't speak anymore, growing tense even though the location of the jumper call, here in the heart of Hollywood tourism, made it likely that it was just a stunt by some publicity junkie. The three cops were trying their best not to take it too seriously. Until they climbed to the observation deck encircling the cupola and saw him, shirtless now, straddling a railing with arms outstretched, tennis shoes pressed together, head slightly bowed in the crucifixion pose. This, as tourists, hustlers, tweakers, pickpockets, cartoon characters, and various Hollywood crazies were standing down below, yelling at him to stop being a chickens.h.i.t and jump for Jesus.

"Oh, s.h.i.t!" Cat said, speaking for all of them.

The three cops walked very slowly toward him and he turned around on the railing to face them, wobbling precariously, making onlookers down below either scream or cheer. His sandy, shoulder-length hair was blowing in his face, and his eyes behind wire-rimmed gla.s.ses were even more pale blue than Ronnie's. In fact, she thought he looked a lot like her cousin Bob, a drummer in a rock band. Maybe it was that, but she took the lead and the others let her have it.

She smiled at him and said, "Hey, whadda you say you come on down here and let's talk."

"Stay where you are," he said.

She held up her hands, palms forward, and said, "Okay, okay, I'm cool with that. But how about coming down now?"

"You're going to kill me, aren't you?" he said.

"Of course not," Ronnie said. "I just wanna talk to you. What's your name? They call me Ronnie."

He did not respond, so she said, "Ronnie is short for Veronica. A lot of people see my name somewhere and think I'm a guy."

Still he did not respond, so she said, "Do you have a nickname?"

"Tell them to go," he said, pointing at Nate and Cat. "I know they want to kill me."

Ronnie turned around, but the others had immediately retreated to the door when they heard his demand, Cat saying, "Be careful, Ronnie!"

Then Ronnie said to him, "See, they've gone."

"Take off your gun belt," he said. "Or I'll jump."

"Okay!" Ronnie said, unfastening her Sam Browne and lowering it to her feet, close enough to grab for it.

"Step away from the gun," he said. "I know you want to kill me."

"Why would I kill you?" Ronnie said, taking a single step toward him. "You're getting ready to kill yourself. You see, that wouldn't make sense, would it? No, I don't wanna kill you. I wanna help you. I know I can if you'll just get down from that railing and talk to me."

"Do you have a cigarette?" he said, and for a few seconds he swayed in the wind, and Ronnie sucked in a lungful of air, then let it out slowly.

"I don't smoke," she said, "but I can have my partner find you a cigarette. Her name's Cat. She's very nice and I bet you'd like her a lot."

"Never mind," he said. "I don't need a cigarette. I don't need anything."

"You need a friend," Ronnie said. "I'd like to be that friend. I have a cousin who looks just like you. What's your name?"

"My name's Randolph Bronson and I'm not crazy," he said. "I know what I'm doing."

"I don't think you're crazy, Randolph," Ronnie said, and now she could feel sweat running down her temples, and her hands felt slimy. "I just think you're feeling sad and need someone to talk to. That's why I'm here. To talk to you."

"Do you know what it's like to be called crazy? And schizophrenic?" he asked.

"Tell me about it, Randolph," Ronnie said, walking another step closer until he said, "Stop!"

"I'm sorry!" she said. "I'll stay right here if it makes you feel better. Tell me about your family. Who do you live with?"

"I'm a burden to them," he said. "A financial burden. An emotional burden. They won't be sorry to see me gone."

After six long minutes of talking, Ronnie Sinclair was fairly certain that the young man was ready to surrender. She found out that he was nineteen years old and had been treated for mental illness most of his life. Ronnie believed that she had him now, that she could talk him down from the railing. She was addressing him as "Randy" by the time backup arrived on the street, including a rescue ambulance and the fire department, whose engine only served to clog traffic. Still no crisis negotiator from Metropolitan Division had arrived.

And the first supervisor to show up at the scene was Sergeant Jason Treakle, who'd been on a suck-up mission to buy two hamburgers and an order of fries for the night-watch lieutenant. Sergeant Treakle had gotten a brainstorm the moment he'd heard the call. The idea actually made him say "Wow!" aloud, though he was alone in the car. Then he looked at the bag of burgers next to him, turned on his light bar, and sped to the location of the jumper call.

The young sergeant had recently read about an attempted suicide where a jumper had been talked down by a crisis negotiator who'd bought him a sandwich that they shared while talking at length about the people, real and imagined, who were tormenting him. The crisis negotiator had gotten her photo in the L.A. Times L.A. Times and had done several TV interviews. and had done several TV interviews.

When the midwatch supervisor ascended to the tower, carrying the bag of burgers, and brushed past Cat Song and Hollywood Nate, Cat said, "Sergeant Treakle, wait! Ronnie's talking to the guy. Wait, please."

Hollywood Nate said, "Don't go out there, Sergeant."

The sergeant said, "Don't tell me my job, Weiss."

Nate Weiss, who had several years in age and job experience on his former supervisor, said, "Sergeant, n.o.body should ever ever bust in on a suicide standoff. This might be Hollywood but this is not a movie, and there's no air bag down there." bust in on a suicide standoff. This might be Hollywood but this is not a movie, and there's no air bag down there."

"Thanks for your wise counsel," Sergeant Treakle said with a chilly glance at Nate. "I'll keep it in mind if you ever become my boss."

Ronnie turned and saw him striding confidently along the deck and said, "Sergeant! Go back, please! Let me handle -"

The anguished moan from Randolph Bronson made her spin around. He was staring at the uniformed sergeant with the condescending smile and the bulging paper bag in his hand, into which he was reaching.

The boy's pale eyes had gotten huge behind the eyegla.s.ses. Then he looked at Ronnie and said, "He's going to kill me!"

And he was gone. Just like that.

The screams from the crowd, a gust of wind, and Cat's and Nate's shouts all prevented Ronnie from hearing her own cry as she lunged forward and gaped over the railing. She saw him bounce once on the pavement. Several bluesuits immediately began holding back the most morbid of the boulevard onlookers.

A few minutes later, there were a dozen more uniforms in the lobby of the building who observed Ronnie Sinclair, eyes glistening, yelling curses into the face of Sergeant Jason Treakle, who had gone pale and didn't know how to respond to his subordinate.

Ronnie didn't remember what she'd yelled, but Cat later said, "You started dropping F-bombs and it was beautiful. There's nothing Treakle can do about it, because now he knows he was dead wrong. And now that kid is just plain dead."

When they got out to the street, they were amazed to see that Randolph Bronson's wire-rimmed gla.s.ses were still affixed to his face and only one lens was broken. He had not blown apart, as some of them do, but there was a ma.s.sive pool of blood.

Cat put an arm around Ronnie's shoulder, squeezed it, and said, "Gimme the keys to our shop. Let me drive us to the station."

Ronnie handed Cat the car keys without objection.

Compa.s.sionate Charlie Gilford, who never missed a newsworthy incident, especially with carnage involved, arrived in time to observe them picking up the body, and he offered his usual on-scene commentary.

The lanky veteran detective sucked his teeth and said to the body s.n.a.t.c.her driving the coroner's van, "So, one of our patrol sergeants thought he could keep this looney tune from a back flip by feeding him a meal, right? Man, this is f.u.c.king Hollywood! Everybody knows you can walk a couple blocks to Musso and Frank's and dine with movie stars on comfort food. And Wolfgang Puck's got a joint right inside the Kodak Center with some of the trendiest eats in town. But what does our a.s.s-wipe sergeant do to cheer up a depressed wack job? He brings the dude a f.u.c.king Big Mac! No wonder the fruitloop jumped."

Later that night, Compa.s.sionate Charlie Gilford saw Ronnie Sinclair in the report room ma.s.saging her temples, waiting for the interrogation from Force Investigation Division, knowing that this one would be handled just like an officer-involved shooting.

The detective said merrily, "I hear you really carpet bombed Chickenlips Treakle, Ronnie. Hollywood Nate told me you wouldn't hear that that many 'motherf.u.c.kers' at a Chris Rock concert. Way to go, girl!" many 'motherf.u.c.kers' at a Chris Rock concert. Way to go, girl!"

ALSO BY JOSEPH WAMBAUGH.

FICTION.

The Blue Knight

The Choirboys

The Black Marble

The Glitter Dome

The Delta Star

The Secrets of Harry Bright

The Golden Orange