Authors: Len Norman
“Who could possibly know,” Calvin said.
“What comes out is, ‘You fucking bitch…you ruined my life.’
“Really? So you ate your toast plain?” Quentin asked.
“Yup, really, and I have no place to stay.”
“That’s what you get for thinking out loud. I have to tell you, I’m taking your wife’s side on this one,” Calvin said.
“Really?”
“We’re discussing important issues here and maybe you should quit drinking and go back home and patch things up with the missus while we work out this good-versus-evil stuff,” Reg said.
“Well, I don’t guess you have to get pissy about it. She won’t let me back in, I already tried.”
“Then you can join us. We’re having a little caucus about Sergeant Trapp and Lieutenant Chapman. They’re both dinking with Reg,” Calvin said.
“No surprise there. The deputies are heartened by the fact they’re city cops and not with us. Especially Trapp, that’s the last guy in the world that should be a cop. Everybody knows that much,” the deputy said.
When they told him about what had been going on with the assault complaint he simply shook his head. He went to the beer cooler and brought back four more, and all of them talked things out. A few weeks later Reg saw Chapman in the hallway outside the squad room. “What’s up Lieutenant? Anything new on Trapp’s investigation? Is he going to call out the tracking dogs? Maybe get some handwriting samples?”
“Good news for you, Reg. His roommate came forward and told us what happened. After you mistreated Fletcher in the police station he went home and had the roommate beat the shit out of him. Then he came into the station and filed the complaint against you. He eventually said he wanted to get you fired.”
“Excellent news, Lieutenant, I bet that really disappointed you and Trapp, right?”
“Little bit. Trapp took the news hard. I counseled him and told him that guys like you eventually slip up and every dog has his day. Stuff like that.”
“Good for you. So you’ll be going to the prosecutor and request a warrant on Fletcher and his false police report?”
“Why would I do that? We’ve already spent too many man hours on all of this. Fletcher is no longer in the police reserves. Isn’t that enough?”
“I hope you don’t mind if I discuss this with the Chief, chain of command protocol and such.”
“Whatever.”
Reg and Chapman stared at each other and Reg didn’t even try to hide the contempt he felt for Chapman. Reg walked into the Chief’s outer office and asked his secretary to arrange a meeting. The Chief agreed to speak with him a few days later.
Reg walked into the meeting expecting to see Trapp and Chapman, but the room was empty except for the two of them. The Chief sat at his desk and asked Reg what was on his mind.
“I’ll tell you sir, Sergeant Trapp tried his best to nail me on assault charges and as it turned out the so-called victim had a friend tune him up and then tried to blame me for it. Trapp never even talked to all of the witnesses, and if that wasn’t bad enough, the guy finally admits he lied about the whole thing to get me fired and Trapp ends the investigation. I have to tell you, Chief, all of this makes me sad.”
“I understand how that would. The Sergeant and Lieutenant have already told me their version, and they seem to think you bear some responsibility in all of this.”
“With all due respect Chief, the Sergeant is a fool and the Lieutenant doesn’t like me. I’m as pure as the driven snow with regard to all of this. You should know practically everyone on the department thinks they should go after Fletcher for filing a false police report. When I asked the Lieutenant to do exactly that much; he said they’d already spent too many man hours on the so-called investigation.”
“Why are you here today?”
“I’d like your permission to pursue this with the prosecutor. It seems pretty clear to me the Sergeant and Lieutenant are either unable or unwilling to step up and do the right thing. If the, excuse me, sir, if the assholes in Riverside get wind of this it’ll be open hunting season on street cops. I’m just giving you my point of view, is all.”
“I think we both know what you’re up to Officer Thorne and I approve. Good luck. I’m anxious to see how it plays out.”
Reg went to the prosecuting attorney’s office the very next day and a warrant was issued against Fletcher for filing a false police report. Reg was ecstatic and Phoebe told her friends it was the happiest she’d seen him in years. The trial was set for the end of the following month. A couple of weeks later Reg was asked to stop by the judge’s courtroom. The secretary was happy to see him. She said, “Fletcher pled guilty and the judge asked me to give you this package. I think you’ll like it.”
The package contained a cassette. He went back to the station and sat by the tape player in the squad room. It wasn’t very long but the conversation on the tape was telling. Fletcher’s attorney had instructed him to plead nolo contendere. Such a plea would, if accepted, fix a fine or sentence the same as if Fletcher had pled guilty. The difference being nolo contendere couldn’t be used to prove misconduct in a civil suit for monetary damages while a plea of guilty certainly could. The judge, just like the chief of police, knew what Reg was up to and they both approved. Reg played the tape.
“Your honor, my client wishes to enter a plea of nolo contendere in this matter.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, your honor.”
“I happen to think an in-court admission is in order. What did he do? Why did he do it?”
Mumbling… “Your honor, my client is concerned with civil exposure.”
“Your client put himself in that position. He can tell the court what happened or we can go to trial. Which is it?”
Mumbling… “I plead guilty,” Fletcher said.
“Tell the court why you lied on the police report.”
Mumbling… “I wanted to get the police officer fired.”
“The court accepts your plea. You may appear for sentencing on the twenty-third of next month.”
Reg took the tape home with him and thought things over. The following week he contacted a former assistant prosecutor that was practicing law in one of Riverside’s largest law firms. He met with him and had all of the police reports and audio cassette in hand. The lawyer was impressed with his diligence. “This is good Reg, real good. I’ll run it by the partners and get back with you.”
A couple of weeks later the lawyer met with him. “You have a hell of a case Reg, one that would easily be won in any court. We ran a background on Fletcher and he’s a mess. The guy’s broke and any judgment we received would never be collected. You probably heard the term deep pockets? This guy has no pockets.”
“Let’s sue him anyway. You can keep anything you get for yourself. I don’t care about his money. I want to teach him and others like him a lesson. Take the case and you can have whatever’s out there. Garnish his pay. I don’t expect a single cent. Not one! This guy’s a prick. He tried to get me fired so let’s sue him, it’ll be a hoot. What do you say?”
“Sorry Reg, I’d love to help you but it’s just not cost effective. There’s nothing to sue him for. He’s broke.”
Reg looked down at the floor and the look on his face nearly broke the lawyers heart. “I’m sorry Reg, it is what it is.”
“I know. I understand completely and appreciate your time. It was a pretty good idea, huh?”
“It was a damn great idea. The guy will get what’s coming to him sooner or later. At least he’s not in the police reserves anymore. That’s something right?”
“I guess it is,” Reg said. “There is that.”
A few years later Fletcher was convicted for forging drug prescriptions and did nine months in the county jail.
Reg had moved on and hardly noticed.
Five Card Draw
1968
1
968 was a decisive year for Harley. He was overflowing with new-found freedom and plenty of cash to do the things only he would dream of doing. He had a wide array of weapons that he practiced with and categorized as to the efficiency of each.
The flamethrower that was used on Kathy Harrison was effective but too bulky, his box cutters and high-end knives were equally effective but required closer proximity and he worried about messy blood splatters. While the personal touch was satisfying to Harley, he didn’t want to run the risk of blood on his clothing. Explosive devices were highly successful but required careful planning. Some of his kills were of a more urgent nature, so to speak. When a REAL person surfaced he might have to act immediately. All things being equal he preferred guns and had a variety of revolvers and pistols and his lightweight .357 Ruger with the two-inch barrel length made it easy to conceal in his leg holster.
The passenger door had a hidden cache of larger handguns, including his favorite—a Colt .45 with a five-inch barrel and a magazine capacity of eight bullets. He was confident the secret compartment in the inner door panel would serve him well. The last thing he wanted was someone finding handguns in that door.
Harley delivered the Ace of Clubs to a gentleman in Akron, Ohio, on the very same day Martin Luther King, Jr. was slain in Memphis, Tennessee. Harley was three suited and decided to go with hearts next. The Two of Hearts was close at hand as he headed east.
Election Day had finally arrived and when all was said and done, Richard Nixon would be the next President of the United States. He was able to gather forty-three percent of the popular vote and more than enough electoral votes. Harley would spend the next few years keeping an eye on the Quaker and his sidekick Spiro Agnew. When he looked at Nixon and Agnew he saw a couple of lowbrow philistines; political hucksters at best.
Harley spent New Year’s Eve in Pittsburg, buying drinks for a lovely coed from Ohio State. They spent a week together before Harley tired of her and continued eastbound. He spent the next couple of months in Philadelphia where he rented three safety deposit boxes in three different banks. His aunt hired professional money managers to oversee his trust. The money would be wisely invested and accounted for in ways Simon had preferred not to entertain. Harley’s trust was currently valued at well over twenty million and Caroline had advanced him three hundred thousand to tide him over until his twenty-first birthday.
He split most of the money between the three safety deposit boxes and kept some cash on hand. Harley had five different sets of identification and passports. He carried an American Express and MasterCard, using one or the other whenever possible.
He left a couple of cards in Philadelphia before leaving. A decapitated man’s body was eventually found in a paddleboat lake at the Philadelphia Zoo and a woman’s body was discovered near Rittenhouse Square.
Three days after Neil Armstrong walked on the moon Harley took his own small step toward wreaking more havoc. He was shooting pool in a bar in the northwest section of Wichita Falls, Texas. It was one of the few original buildings that remained in the immediate area. A tornado leveled most of the others in April of 1964, and Harley would soon unleash his own classic funnel-shaped cloud that would nearly match the number of deaths the tornado had produced.
Leland Burns lost again, having watched Harley run the table and then sink the eight ball in a near-impossible bank shot. Harley was fifty bucks ahead when Leland decided to coax him away from the pool table and straight to a high-stakes poker game.
“So Harley, do you like to play cards?”
“Cards have always been a big part of my life. What do you have in mind?”
“There’s a game going on not too far from here. You could follow me, if you want to play.”
They walked out of the bar and into the hot and humid Texas night. Harley drove behind Leland and parked his Barracuda on a side street. They walked in together. The establishment was a large house with rooms set aside for illegal drugs and gambling. It was a slow night and Harley sat down at one of the poker tables while Leland watched. There were five players and Harley bought a stack of chips, making him the sixth, the maximum number of players allowed in five-card draw. They played for a couple hours and he was seven thousand ahead when he realized they were the last players in the room. The other tables were empty, but Harley understood what Leland was up to. All five of his opponents were in on it. They were REAL people, all five of them. Harley was ready to raise the stakes a bit.
He turned to the dealer and said, “This is getting a little boring. We should raise the bet limit.”
“Fine by me, what about you guys?”
One by one the other four agreed and the cards were dealt. There was over twenty thousand dollars on the table when Harley called the remaining player. The dealer had a cigar in his mouth and blew a plume of putrid smoke as he laid down his hand.
“Four aces! It was nice playing with you, kid.” Sure enough, he laid down four aces and the five of hearts; he moved to seize his winnings.
Harley smiled. “Hold on, I wanna show you my hand.”
“Huh?”
Harley laid down a straight flush; the Four, Five, Six, Seven, and Eight of Hearts. The back of Harley’s cards had two baseball players as well as two large circles with baseballs inside of each circle. A single baseball was between two baseball bats. The five cards were blue while all the other cards on the table were standard red Bicycle poker cards. Even though his cards were clearly from a different deck, Harley reached for the pot.
“You gotta be kidding me. Those aren’t the cards we’ve been playing with. I already laid down the five of hearts.”
Harley slowly reached for the Ruger in his leg holster. “Well, these are the cards I think you should play with and I want all of you to keep one as a token of my gratitude. Five of you at once…who knew?”
He pulled the Ruger out and held it point blank at the head of the man sitting to his left. Blood and gray matter sprayed the card player sitting next to him. His next shot was at the man on his immediate right—another head shot with the same results as the first.
Leland bolted for the door and Harley shot him in the back. The man sitting across from Harley spewed the contents of his stomach on the poker table, saturating the money and Harley’s five special cards. He was the least of Harley’s worries and would be saved for last.
Another player sitting more or less across from Harley began to get up and was shot in the throat and actually made a noise just like the deep, harsh bleating wail of a goat. The dealer was no longer concerned with the four aces he’d been dealt; rather, he scampered and nearly made it to the door. He was soon dispatched with a well-placed shot to the back of his head. Harley proudly smiled at that fifth shot. Blood, brains, and whatever else was once inside his noggin oozed down the six-panel wood-grain door.
He turned to the fifth player and said, “That last shot did make a mess. You look a little green around the gills.”
The man gazed up from the poker table and said, “Please don’t kill me. I don’t want to die…”
Harley walked up behind him and said, “Hush, this will just take a second or so.”
He cocked the hammer and let the Ruger do the rest. All five were dead and they had it coming. It was either them or Harley. He nonchalantly walked across the room as he reloaded the Ruger. Harley nudged Leland with his foot. Leland looked up as he was dying.
“What did we do? Why did you shoot me?” Leland asked.
“You know why. You tried to set me up. Those guys were REAL people. All five of them. They each get a card. You get a second bullet for helping them. You brought me here. All of this is on you.”
Harley held the gun to Leland’s forehead and said, “Thanks for playing,” as he squeezed the trigger.
He placed a playing card next to each of the five card players and walked out the front door with his head held up high.
Harley got in the Barracuda and headed out of town. He hated the REAL people more than anything in the world, but troublemakers like Leland ran a close second. It was best to move on before the police showed up.
Harley drove by a recreation area with a lake and nearby marina. It was four in the morning. After pulling into a parking spot near the boat launch he opened the panel on the passenger door and removed the cache of handguns. He walked to the end of a dock and threw all of the handguns into the lake, including the Ruger that performed so well only hours earlier. The plunking noise as the guns hit the water sounded like progress to him; it really was time to move on.
He drove to Denton, Texas, and found a truck stop where he pulled in and took a nap. He woke up a couple of hours later and found a used car lot and the salesman was happy to buy the Barracuda. Harley didn’t care that the salesman only offered six hundred for the car.
His next stop was the bus station and a ride to Dallas. He spent two days there resting up, and then purchased an airline ticket to Philadelphia. It was time for a real change of scenery.
Harley decided a vacation was in order after the mess he left in Wichita Falls. He purchased a ticket to London and took plenty of cash with him. He was eager to try out his false identification, credit cards, and passport.
He loved the Essex countryside and was impressed with the Kelvedon Hatch Secret Nuclear Bunker, built in 1952. It was designed with the capacity of holding well over five hundred military and civilian personnel in the event of nuclear war, but it did nothing to provide security for the man from Bedworth who was also visiting that same day. He died with a card in his hand.
Harley spent six months in England and enjoyed the culture and sights that Scotland and Ireland had to offer as well. He travelled to France and Belgium for short stays and a couple more cards were left in places where Harley once stood.
A few months later he was in Montpelier, Vermont, as he watched President Nixon on national television raising hell about Vietnam. The Commander-in-Chief was announcing the invasion of Cambodia and a need to draft countless soldiers; one hundred and fifty thousand more would be needed to increase the war effort. Naturally, this sparked massive war protests and rallies throughout the country.
Four days later trouble was brewing in Ohio on the campus of Kent State University. Five hundred students were protesting near the grassy knoll in the center of the campus. The new business in Cambodia was the latest catalyst for dissent. The National Guardsman had bayonets fixed to their M1 rifles and when the smoke cleared four students were dead and another nine were wounded.
An investigation at the direction of the President concluded the action taken by the guardsmen was unwarranted, unnecessary, and inexcusable. While some guardsmen were indicted all charges were set aside due to lack of evidence. The trampled Queen of Hearts on campus went completely unnoticed.
Vice President Agnew resigned in October of 1973 after serving four years and looking down his nose at critics of the Vietnam War in general and the press in particular. He faced deep scrutiny for financial misdeeds and eventually entered a plea of no contest for income tax evasion—just like Al Capone.
The very next year, Agnew’s mentor followed his lead. President Richard Nixon threw in the towel in August of 1974. The Watergate shenanigans led to his eventual downfall. America had no love for a dishonest president but there was so much more to this particular puzzle. Flimflam was his true profession. His paranoia and penchant for dirty tricks were always in the background…guiding him and the presidency to new lows. The Watergate scandal and cover-up may have finally caught him, but his crimes were numerous and viewed as deplorable. His legacy was a traumatized and perplexed nation.
Harley loved it and followed the downfall of both men. He was especially fond of Nixon’s, “I am not a crook,” declaration at a press conference in the midst of charges concerning the Watergate break-in and ensuing dishonor.
While all of that was going on the killing continued and Harley was in no hurry. He believed slow and steady would win the race and thought it best to pace himself. He was drawn to Charles Whitman and his heinous exploits in 1966. Whitman introduced America to a new form of random violence in Austin, Texas. After killing his mother and wife, he climbed the University of Texas Tower and for the next hour and a half managed to kill fourteen more people and injured dozens more. Harley liked his style but thought the guy could have spread the misery out over a period of months and hopefully years instead of ninety minutes. Harley wouldn’t make the same mistake. He’d take all of the time that was needed to complete his assignment: saving his own ass from the REAL people—the only ones that could harm him.
By 1975 he was one-suited with only thirteen cards to go. He’d saved the best for last: Spades. Harley wondered how long it would take to deal the last card—the Ace. He wondered what the person would be like. Until then the Two of Spades was next.