The Murder Book Read online

  "Hi, I'm Sheridan," he said. "The tour coordinator." He wore a white shirt, blue jeans, brown boots, had a narrow body and a clean, smooth face full of optimism.

  "Thought that was Trish."

  "Trish is the overall tour manager. My boss." He glanced at the house. "Must be nice, living up here."

  "Uh-huh."

  "So you're a psychologist."

  "Uh-huh."

  "I was a psych major in college. Studied psychoacoustics at UC Davis. Used to be a sound engineer."

  How nice for you. "Hmm."

  "Robin's going to be part of something important."

  "Hey," I said.

  Robin came down the front stairs with Spike on a leash. She wore a pink T-shirt and faded jeans and tennis shoes and big hoop earrings, began directing the roadies as they loaded her valises and her toolboxes into the van. Spike looked stoned. Like most dogs, his emotional barometer is finely tuned and for the last few days he'd been uncommonly compliant. I went over and stooped to pat his knobby French bulldog head, then I kissed Robin, and recited, "Have fun," and turned my back and trudged up to the house.

  She stood there, alongside Sheridan. Waved.

  Standing at the door, I pretended not to notice, then decided to wave.

  Sheridan got behind the wheel of the van and everyone piled in behind him.

  They rumbled away.

  Finally.

  Now, for the hard part.

  I started off determined to maintain my dignity. That lasted about an hour and for the next three days I turned off the phone, didn't check with my service or open the curtains or shave or collect the mail. I did read the paper because news coverage is heavily biased toward the hopeless. But other people's misfortunes failed to cheer me and the words danced by, as foreign as hieroglyphics. The little I ate, I didn't taste. I'm no problem drinker but Chivas became a friend. Dehydration took its toll; my hair got dry and my eyes creaked and my joints stiffened. The house, always too big, expanded to monstrous proportions. The air curdled.

  On Wednesday, I went down to the pond and fed the koi because why should they suffer? That got me into a scut-work frenzy, scouring and dusting and sweeping and straightening. On Thursday I finally collected my messages. Robin had called every day, left numbers in Santa Barbara and Oakland. By Tuesday, she sounded anxious, by Wednesday, confused and annoyed and talking fast: The bus was headed for Portland. Everything was fine, Spike was fine, she was working hard, people were being great. Iloveyouhopeyou'reokay.

  She called twice on Thursday, wondered out loud if I'd gone off on a trip of my own. Left a cell-phone number.

  I punched buttons. Got: Your call cannot be completed.

  Just after 1 P.M. I put on shorts and a workout shirt and sneakers, began stomping up Beverly Glen facing the traffic, easing into a clumsy jog when I felt loose enough, ending up running harder and faster and more punishingly than I'd done for years.

  When I got home, my body burned and I could barely breathe. The mailbox down at the bridle path that leads up to the front gate was stuffed with paper and the postman had left several packages on the ground. I scooped it all up, dumped the batch on the dining room table, thought about more Scotch, drank a half gallon of water instead, returned to the mail and began sorting listlessly.

  Bills, ads, solicitations from real estate brokers, a few worthy causes, lots of dubious ones. The packages were a psychology book I'd ordered a while back, a free sample of toothpaste guaranteed to heal my gums and feed my smile, and an eight-by-twelve rectangle wrapped in coarse blue paper with DR. A. DELAWARE and my address typed on a white label.

  No return information. Downtown postmark, no stamps, just a meter. The blue paper, a heavy linen rag so substantial it felt like cloth, had been folded neatly and sealed tightly with clear tape. Slitting the folds revealed another snug layer of wrapping— pink butcher paper that I peeled away.

  Inside was a three-ring binder. Blue, pebble-grain leather— substantial morocco, thumbed, grayed, and glossy in spots.

  Stick-on gold letters were centered precisely on the front cover.

  THE MURDER BOOK

  I flipped the cover to a blank, black frontispiece. The next page was also black paper, encased in a stiff plastic jacket.

  But not blank. Mounted with black, adhesive corner pockets was a photograph: sepia-toned, faded, with margins the color of too-whitened coffee.

  Medium shot of a man's body lying on a metal table. Glass-doored cabinets in the background.

  Both feet were severed at the ankles, placed just under ragged tibial stumps, like a puzzle in partial reassembly. No left arm on the corpse. The right was a mangled lump. Same for the torso above the nipples. The head was wrapped in cloth.

  A typed caption on the bottom margin read: East L.A., nr. Alameda Blvd. Pushed under a train by common-law wife.

  The facing page featured a shot of similar vintage: Two sprawled gape-mouthed bodies— men— lying on a wooden plank floor, angled at forty degrees from each other. Dark stains spread beneath the corpses, tinted deep brown by age. Both victims wore baggy pants with generous cuffs, plaid shirts, lace-up work boots. Extravagant holes dotted the soles of the man on the left. A shot glass lay on its side near the elbow of the second, clear liquid pooling near the rim.

  Hollywood, Vermont Ave. Both shot by "friend" in dispute over money.

  I turned the page to a photo that appeared less antique— black-and-white images on glossy paper, close-up of a couple in a car. The woman's position concealed her face: stretched across the man's chest and sheathed by a mass of platinum blond curls. Polka-dot dress, short sleeves, soft arms. Her companion's head rested against the top of the car seat, stared up at the dome light. A black blood-stream trickled from his mouth, separated into rivulets when it reached his lapel, dribbled down his necktie. Skinny necktie, dark with a pattern of tumbling dice. That and the width of the lapel said the fifties.

  Silver Lake, near the reservoir, adulterers, he shot her, then put the gun in his mouth.

  Page 4: pale, naked flesh atop the rumpled covers of a Murphy bed. The thin mattress took up most of the floor space of a dim, wretched closet of a room. Undergarments lay crumpled at the foot. A young face stiffened by rigor, lividity pools at the shins, black-thatched crotch advertised by splayed legs, panty hose gathered to midcalf. I knew sexual positioning when I saw it so the caption was no surprise.

  Wilshire, Kenmore St., Rape-murder. Seventeen-year-old Mexican girl, strangled by boyfriend.

  Page 5: Central, Pico near Grand, 89 y.o. lady crossing street, purse snatch turned to head-injury homicide.

  Page 6: Southwest, Slauson Ave. Negro gambler beaten to death over craps game.

  The first color photo showed up on page ten: Red blood on sand-colored linoleum, the green-gray pallor that marked escape of the soul. A fat, middle-aged man sat slumped amid piles of cigarettes and candy, his sky-blue shirt smeared purple. Propped near his left hand was a sawed-off baseball bat with a leather thong threaded through the handle.

  Wilshire, Washington Blvd. near La Brea, liquor store owner shot in holdup. Tried to fight back.

  I flipped faster.

  Venice, Ozone Avenue, woman artist attacked by neighbor's dog. Three years of arguments.

  . . . Bank robbery, Jefferson and Figueroa. Teller resisted, shot six times.

  . . . Strong-arm street robbery, Broadway and Fifth. One bullet to the head. Suspect stuck around, discovered still going through victim's pockets.

  . . . Echo Park, woman stabbed by husband in kitchen. Bad soup.

  Page after page of the same cruel artistry and matter-of-fact prose.

  Why had this been sent to me?

  That brought to mind an old cartoon: Why not?

  I thumbed through the rest of the album, not focusing on the images, just searching for some personal message.

  Finding only the inert flesh of strangers.

  Forty-three deaths, in all.

  At the rear, a black end page w
ith another centered legend, similar stick-on gold letters:

  THE END

  CHAPTER 4

  I hadn't talked to my best friend in a while, and that was fine with me.

  After giving the D.A. my statement on Lauren Teague's murder, I'd had my fill of the criminal justice system, was happy to stay out of the loop until trial time. A wealthy defendant and a squadron of paid dissemblers meant that would be years away, not months. Milo had remained chained to the details, so I had a good excuse for keeping my distance: The guy was swamped, give him space.

  The real reason was, I didn't feel like talking to him, or anyone. For years, I'd preached the benefits of self-expression but my tonic since childhood had been isolation. The pattern had been set early by all those bowel-churning nights huddled in the basement, hands over ears, humming "Yankee Doodle" in order to block out the paternal rage thundering from above.

  When things got rough, I curled like a mollusk into a gray pocket of solitary confinement.

  Now I had forty-three death shots on my dining room table. Death was Milo's raw material.

  I called the West L.A. detective's room.

  "Sturgis."

  "Delaware."

  "Alex. What's up?"

  "I got something I thought you should see. Photo album full of what look like crime-scene photos."

  "Photos or copies?"

  "Photos."

  "How many?"

  "Forty-three."

  "You actually counted," he said. "Forty-three from the same case?"

  "Forty-three different cases. They look to be arranged chronologically."

  "You 'got' them? How?"

  "Courtesy the U.S. Postal Service, first-class, downtown cancellation."

  "No idea who might've favored you with this."

  "I must have a secret admirer."

  "Crime-scene shots," he said.

  "Or someone takes very nasty vacations and decided to keep a scrapbook." The call-waiting signal clicked. Usually I ignore the intrusion, but maybe it was Robin from Portland. "Hold for a sec."

  Click.

  "Hello, sir," said a cheerful female voice. "Are you the person who pays the phone bill in the house?"

  "No, I'm the sex toy," I said, and reconnected to Milo. Dial tone. Maybe he'd gotten an emergency call. I punched his desk number, got the West L.A. civilian receptionist, didn't bother to leave a message.

  The doorbell rang twenty minutes later. I hadn't changed out of my running clothes, hadn't made coffee or checked the fridge— the first place Milo heads. Looking at portraits of violent death would make most people lose their appetites, but he's been doing his job for a long time, takes comfort food to a whole new level.

  I opened the door, and said, "That was quick."

  "It was lunchtime, anyway." He walked past me to where the blue leather binder sat in full view, but made no move to pick it up, just stood there, thumbs hooked in his belt loops, big belly heaving from the run up to the terrace.

  Green eyes shifted from the book to me. "You sick or something?"

  I shook my head.

  "So what's this, a new look?" A sausage finger aimed at my stubbled face.

  "Maintaining a leisurely shaving schedule," I said.

  He sniffed, took in the room. "No one chewing at my cuffs. El Poocho out back with Robin?"

  "Nope."

  "She's here, right?" he said. "Her truck's out front."

  "You must be a detective," I said. "Unfortunately, false leads abound. She's out." I pointed to the book. "Check that out while I forage in the larder. If I can find anything that hasn't petrified, I'll fix you a sandwich—"

  "No thanks."

  "Something to drink?"

  "Nothing." He didn't budge.

  "What's the problem?" I said.

  "How do I put this delicately," he said. "Okay: You look like shit, this place smells like an old-age home, Robin's truck is here but she isn't and my bringing her up makes your eyes drop to the floor like a suspect. What the hell's going on, Alex?"

  "I look like shit?"

  "To euphemize."

  "Oh, well," I said. "Better cancel the photo shoot with In Style. And speaking of photography . . ." I held the book out to him.

  "Changing the subject," he said, squinting down at me from his six-three vantage. "What do they call that in psychologist school?"

  "Changing the subject."

  He shook his head, kept his expression mild, folded his arms across his chest. But for spring-loaded tension around the eyes and mouth, he looked at peace. Pallid, acne-pitted face a bit leaner than usual, beer gut light-years from flat but definitely less bulge.

  Dieting? On the wagon, yet again?

  He'd dressed with uncommon color harmony: cheap but clean navy blazer, cotton khakis, white shirt with just a touch of fray at the neckline, navy tie, brand-new beige desert boots with pink rubber soles that squeaked as he shifted his weight and continued to study me. Brand-new haircut, too. The usual motif— clipped fuzzy at the sides and back, the top left long and shaggy, multiple cowlicks sprouting at the crown. A black forelock hooked over his pockmarked forehead. The hair from his temples to the bottoms of too-long sideburns had denatured to snow-white. The contrast with the black hair on top was unseemly— Mr. Skunk, he'd taken to calling himself.

  "Spiffed and freshly barbered," I said. "Is this some new-leaf thing? Should I not attempt to feed you? Either way, take the damn book."

  "Robin—"

  "Later." I thrust the blue album at him.

  He kept his arms folded. "Just put it back down on the table." Pulling out a pair of surgical gloves from the sets, he encased his hands in latex, studied the blue leather cover, opened the book, read the frontispiece, moved on to the first photo.

  "Old," he murmured. "The tint and the clothes. Probably someone's creepy collection from the attic."

  "Department shots?"

  "Probably."

  "A home collection pilfered from the evidence room?"

  "Cases get filed away, someone gets itchy-fingered, who's gonna notice if one shot per file gets lifted."

  "A cop?"

  "A cop or a civilian ghoul. Lots of people have access, Alex. Some of them like the job because they dig blood."

  " 'The murder book,' " I said. "Same title as an official case file."

  "Same color, too. Whoever sent this knows procedure."

  "Evoking procedure . . . why send it to me?"

  He didn't answer.

  I said, "It's not all antique. Keep going."

  He studied several more photos, flipped back to the initial shot, then forward to where he'd left off. Resuming his inspection, picking up speed and skimming the horror, just as I had. Then he stopped. Stared at a photo toward the back of the book. Chunky knuckles swelled the gloves as he gripped the album.

  "When exactly did you get this?"

  "Today's mail."

  He reached for the wrapping paper, took in the address, verified the postmark. Turned back to the album.

  "What is it?" I said.

  He placed the book on the table, open to the page that had stopped him. Resting his palms on either side of the album, he sat there. Ground his teeth. Laughed. The sound could have paralyzed prey.

  Photograph Number 40.

  A body in a ditch, muddy water pooled in the trough. Rusty blood on beige dirt. Off to the right side of the frame, dry weeds bristled. White-ink arrows were aimed at the subject, but the subject was obvious.

  A young woman, maybe a teenager. Very thin— concave belly, rib cage washboard, fragile shoulders, spindly arms and legs. Slash and puncture wounds meshed her abdomen and neck. Curious black polka dots, too. Both breasts were gone, replaced by purplish discs the shape of marquis diamonds. Her angular face had been posed in profile, gazing to the right. Above her brow, where the hair should have been, floated a ruby cloud.

  Purple ligature marks banded both wrists and ankles. More black dots speckled both legs— punctuation marks ringed with
rosy haloes— inflammation.

  Cigarette burns.

  Long white legs had been drawn up in a parody of sexual welcome.

  I'd skimmed right past this one.

  Central, Beaudry Ave., body dump above 101 freeway on-ramp. Sex murder, scalped and strangled and slashed and burned. NS.