Senior Data Processor Martha P. Szcyszcyk listened to my request without interruption then answered guardedly. “Gloria said to use her name to butter me up, huh?”
“She did.”
“Let me get this straight: You’re a civilian psychologist, not part of Behavioral Sciences.”
I began to explain my relationship with Milo.
“Sounds complicated,” she said. “I know who Sturgis is. If I call him, he’ll verify you?”
“Absolutely.”
“Hold on … okay, here you are. He logged you in last year as an authorized recipient of data.”
“Great.”
“Doesn’t look as if you tried to access anything—oops, my bad, access was limited to a single case, unfortunately you’re expired, Doctor.”
Interesting way to put it, given her job. I said, “If you would call him—”
“Hey,” said Szcyszcyk, “he liked you once, he probably still does, and you’re not exactly asking for state secrets. Give me a name and some stats on this vic.”
I rattled off basics on Deirdre Brand. “She’s forty-nine but looks much older so she may be described as elderly.”
“Most of them do,” she said. “When do you figure she came in?”
“Within the past month or two.”
“That’s a big range but seeing as she’s Caucasian, it narrows it down.”
She put me on hold. One salsa version of “Hey Jude” later, she was back on. “No one by that name but I’ve got two possible Jane Does for you. One has no teeth at all, one has a few.”
“Where were they found?”
“City of Industry and Santa Monica.”
“Where in Santa Monica?”
“Questions, questions, questions … Douglas Park on Wilshire. Died at night, morning cleanup crew found her.”
The beach city bordered West L.A. Division but was outside of Milo’s jurisdiction. I said, “Cause of death?”
“Blunt force trauma to the head, manner is listed as undetermined.”
“Blunt force but not a homicide?”
“Undetermined,” she repeated. “Can’t tell you why.”
“Was there food at the scene?”
“Pardon?”
“Any sign she was eating a meal?”
“That wouldn’t be in here, Doctor. Do you have a last known address for your Ms. Brand? I could plug it in and try to cross-reference.”
“None, longtime homeless,” I said. “She does have a record so when you ran AFIS, I’d expect—”
“She’s on AFIS? So why are we even bothering?” said Szcyszcyk.
“I’ve heard sometimes it takes a while for I.D.’s to be logged.”
“Have you? Yeah, well, I wish that wasn’t true but … uh-oh, hold the hearse. Says here we tried to print the body but couldn’t ’cause her fingertips were eroded.”
“From what?”
“Doesn’t say. But it happens more often than you’d think. My mother, she’s in her eighties, likes to travel, tried to get one of those Global Entry Passes, make her life easier at passport control. They kept trying to pull up usable prints, couldn’t, so when she flies in, she still has to report in person. You see it more in older people, stuff wears out. Also in folks who’ve lived hard, been exposed to the elements, like your vic. Musicians, too—guitarists, they can really alter their fingers. It’s worse with computer scans, when you ink up manually you have better luck, but obviously that didn’t help with Ms. Santa Monica. Now that I’ve got her name I can go backward, start with her prints on file and see if the computer will accept fewer points of agreement. That happens, I’ll phone you—better yet, I’ll tell Sturgis. Bye, Doctor.”
“One more question. Who at Santa Monica PD picked up the case?”
“Says here Detective A. Barrios.”
“Do you have a number?”
She read it off.
“Thanks.”
“Hey, it’s in my best interest,” said Szcyszcyk. “I hate sending Does to the crematorium, anytime we clear one, it’s a good thing.”
Detective Augustin Barrios had a deep, mellow voice and the speech cadence of a man resistant to excitement.
I began by running through my credentials just as I’d just done with Martha Szcyzcyk. Barrios said, “That’s great, working with a psychologist. What can I do for you, Doctor?”
“You recently picked up a case in Douglas Park. I might know your victim’s I.D.”
“Really,” he said. “Tell me.”
When I was finished he said, “Okay, I’m pulling Ms. Brand up … have a mug shot from when she was younger … I guess it’s possible.”
“She’s got a collection of mug shots, try the latest.”
“Oka-ay … yes, that’s her. Thanks, Doctor.”
“The crypt told me COD was undetermined. May I ask why?”
Barrios said, “Guess I’d better be conferring with Lieutenant Sturgis. Appreciate the tip, Doctor.”
An hour later, Milo phoned on his mobile. “Just heard from a Santa Monica D who’s all hinky about you.”
“Were you able to set his mind at ease?”
“Best I could.” He laughed. “Yeah, he’s okay, but not too pleased Brand could end up a homicide. He’d put the file away as undetermined.”
“So they said at the crypt. Barrios wouldn’t tell me why.”
“Blood on a nearby park bench fit with a bad fall. So did Deirdre having a BAL over three times the legal limit and no evidence of a struggle.”
I told him about Brand’s eroded fingerprints.
He said, “Sure, I’ve seen that. Had a vic years ago, longtime fabric dyer, too many caustics, no more whorls and swirls. Fortunately we didn’t need to I.D.
him
, his wife stabbed him in the backyard.” He sighed. “So now I’ve got to consider Ms. Brand as a new member of a really bad club.”
“You’re not buying into a bad fall.”
“Normally, I might, but like you always say, context.”
“Did you ask Barrios if a meal was left—”
“Just about to tell you. Exactly the cuisine you predicted, given poor Deirdre’s station in life.”
“Fast food.”
“Burger, fries, small chocolate shake from Mickey D. Arranged neatly on the bench that was used to brain her.”
“Any of it eaten?”
“Not a crumb.”
“Barrios didn’t think that was strange?”
“Barrios wasn’t looking for strange. Also, there was an empty forty and a half-empty Night Train Express nearby. Barrios figured she blitzed herself dizzy, tumbled and smashed her head against the bench before she could go for the protein.”
I said, “Wining and dining her in the style to which she’s become accustomed.”
“Bastard. But why kill her when he’d already taken the time to sue her?”
“Maybe he lost patience. Or the suit was a way to intimidate her into hiding. He follows, goes after her. Thrill of the hunt.”
“He shows up at the park, she’s not going to panic?”
“With that level of intoxication, a sneak attack doesn’t sound too challenging. When do you start surveillance?”
“Past tense. Fellinger left his office twenty minutes ago and I am presently following in a professionally unobtrusive manner. As in sitting in traffic on Santa Monica Boulevard.”
“Good luck.”
“Good luck for me could mean bad luck for another woman, as in I spot him with another potential victim and can’t do anything unless he acts out in front of me.”
“At least you’ll be there.”
“Armed and dangerous.”
I hit three freeway underpasses, showing Deirdre Brand’s photo to any homeless person willing to acknowledge my presence. The financial outlay totaled a couple hundred bucks.
No one recognized her so I drove to Douglas Park on Wilshire and Twenty-Fifth Street. Pretty place, jeweled with ponds and play areas and smooth-skinned, happy-looking people. I strolled until I spotted an outlier: a grizzled, emaciated man sitting under a magnificent date palm.
I sat down next to him and he ignored me until I slipped a twenty into a filthy hand. Flashing pale toothless gums that said his liver didn’t have much longer, he licked his lips, already tasting the fortified wine he’d buy with the money. Trying to lift himself up with shaky arms, he failed several attempts and gave up.
I positioned the mugshot in front of him.
Nothing.
“You don’t know her?”
“That’s DeeDee,” he said, as if the fact was self-evident.
“She hangs out here?”
“She fell down and kilt herself.” Pointing to a bench in the distance.
“She fall a lot?”
He thought. “There’s a first time for everything.” His laughter was wet and constricted. Drowning in his own wit.
“Who’d she hang out with?”
“No one unless she wanted money, then she could get friendly.”
Yards away, pretty women watched and conversed as their children explored the edges of a pond. A young couple snapped selfies on their phones and laughed.
I said, “Did DeeDee get friendly with anyone in particular?”
“Naw, you don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what?”
“Bother the citizens, they get scairt. You got another twenty?”
I handed him a ten. He said, “Hey, just keep it comin’.”
I didn’t answer.
“You rich for a cop.”
“Salary’s okay, pension’s better.”
“Haw?” He squinted as if faced with a tough math problem, made several more attempts to rise, succeeded the third time.
I stuck with him as he hobbled toward Wilshire. He smelled like the bottom of a clothes hamper seasoned with overcooked fish.
I gave him a five. “So DeeDee didn’t panhandle here—”
“Century City. Where the suits are.”
“She have any problems with the suits?”
“She didn’t tell me.”
“Did she have hassles with anyone?”
He stopped, swayed, looked up at the sky. “DeeDee was … she kept to herself. Real omnistical-socialistic, you know?”
“Omni—”
His look said I was mentally slow. “Means no friends, you just do your thing.” He squinted. “Someone said that.”
Returning to the park, I checked the bench he’d pointed to. Plenty of pigeonshit but time had erased any trace of blood.
Why was I bothering? What difference would finding an old stain make?
Because that’s what compulsives do to allay anxiety. Even with no destination, the motor keeps running.
Someone had probably said that, too.
By eleven p.m., Robin and I were in our pajamas watching a movie on the couch, something forgettable and pretentious based on a book no one had read.
Ninety-four minutes of meaningful looks and pointless long shots accomplished what we’d hoped: readying us for sleep.
Each of us was wired and needed the help. Robin, because an aging rock star with
über-
money and
unter
-intelligence was pressuring her to take on a massive job—fashioning dead-on copies of iconic instruments, down to scars, dents, and scratches.
“I keep telling him every company does relics. As if Charlie Christian’s 150 and Bo Diddley’s Gretsch need improvement. Not to mention the other twenty-seven he wants.”
“How long you figure it would take?”
“To do it right? Years. That’s without factoring in Uno’s ADD.”
“It’ll raise your tax bracket.”
“And alienate me from all my other clients and turn me into his high-paid serf. I’ve told him no twice. He insists he needs me.”
“I can understand that.”
“There may be some of that, too,” she said.
“I can always break his fingers.”
She laughed. “I need to get out of this without having him bad-mouth me all over the industry.”
“He gets nasty, I’ll break his fingers
and
his toes.”
“Not much of a challenge, darling, seeing as meth and tobacco and whatever have weakened his constitution. But those apes who follow him around are another story.”
I gorilla-beat my chest. Robin put her head on it and we watched for a few more minutes. An actress stared at an actor. He pretended to be contemplating something weighty. Ponderous music played, stopped, resumed. The camera swung to a steeple top. Then to an empty room. Then to a hand.
Ah, art.
Not that anything could’ve captured my interest. I’d been obsessing on three murdered women and the fact that others were likely to follow. I knew Milo was out there, somewhere, watching Grant Fellinger. Long, dreary process, no guarantee of results … the camera swung to a screen-filling blue eye, unblinking. Maybe this was the scene the critics had found “compelling.”
My cell beeped. As I read the number, Robin used the call as an excuse to turn off the TV. “Time to brush my teeth. Then I’m emailing Uno, tell him no in capital letters.”
“Bravo.”
I clicked in. “That was quick, Big Guy. You learned something.”
Milo said, “Hope you’re not too comfortable. Even if you are, you’ll want to get the hell over here.”
He rattled off an address in Mar Vista.
I said, “New catering?”
“Oh, boy. This one won’t help your appetite.”
The residence had once been the garage of a moderate-sized mock-Tudor on Grand View. Mar Vista’s name promises ocean views. Many
of its streets don’t deliver but Grand View does. It was too dark to make out much of the Pacific, now, but I did spot a triangle of gloss beneath a tiara of city lights.
Taking a second for a moment of beauty before it started.
The victim was a twenty-four-year-old woman named Francesca DiMargio who worked at a bookstore in Silverlake.
Milo learned little else from her landlords, a retired couple named Eileen and Jack Forbisher who spent a lot of time “cruising.” Meaning ships, not low-riders.
They’d returned a few hours ago from a three-week voyage embarking from Puerto Vallarta, crossing the Panama Canal, and ending up back at Long Beach. Everything seemed in order until Jack Forbisher toted an armful of junk mail to the trash cans at the rear of the property.
“I get closer to the back house and what a stink,” he said. “Even with my allergies, you never forget that smell.”
“Where’ve you smelled it before?” said Milo.
“We were in India last year, they have places where dead bodies are left out in the open.” Forbisher glanced through a rear window of his family room. What he called a back house was a converted garage, now blocked by a tarp on a vertical frame and yellow tape turned bright by a standing LED lamp. “I knew right away something had died but I thought it was a possum or a raccoon or a dog.”