by Thomas Laird
“Next you’ll be telling me that you don’t like the cuisine in White Castle.”
“Not really,” I reply. “But it’ll do, in a pinch.”
“So?” he waits.
I look at him in an extended gaze. He’s got a receding sandy hairline.
“You remind me of Al Pacino in The Godfather—both parts. But you look more like him in the second movie. You look a bit more weathered than Pacino looked in the beginning of the original.”
“If I looked that good, would I be busting my ass looking for murdering fucks all day and all night?”
I smile to show him I’m cracking wise, but I see he already knows how I meant him to take it. I’m beginning to think I won’t ever need to explain much to my new associate copper.
“Think it’s sexual?” he asks, his face gone solemn, now.
“If it’s multiples, all the same guy, you’d think so, no?”
“Depends on the medical report. I’m betting no semen, no sex.”
“Why do you think?”
His lips curl up into a grin.
“If you don’t make it interesting, you get all caught up in the horror. And then where the fuck are you?”
“I think this guy’s into the cutting, not the sex. Maybe the cutting is his version of getting his nuts off. I don’t like to get too psychological or whatever with these knuckleheads. Just go where the evidence goes. Isn’t that what we both heard, first day on the job?”
“I hope we get along, Jimmy. Life’s too fucking short. That pearl of wisdom occurred to me in Korea all the time. You were in that other flower of a country in Asia?’
“Yeah. Two tours. Around a shithole called Bong Son.”
“Did they give you pretty medals?” Doc grins.
“A few. I keep them in a shoebox in our bedroom closet.”
“You’re not gung ho?”
“I was just a trooper in the Army.”
“Me, too.”
“Any awards?” I smile back at him.
“Not so you’d notice. I think I have a shoe box somewhere, too. I keep my rejection slips in there, too.”
“You a writer?” I ask.
“I am a veteran of multiple ‘howevers’ and ‘buts.’ Like Scott Fitzgerald, I could wallpaper the fucking walls of my apartment with the fucking things. But I have been rejected by some of the finest literary rags in the nation, and I plan on a frontal assault of the publishing big boys with a first novel. You know about my illustrious career as a would-be academic, I assume?”
Kindred spirit is the term that comes to my mind.
Chapter 2
Jimmy Parisi, 1979
The body bags don’t show up anymore. I figure that the killer has decided to cool it for a while, or else he’s found a new way of disposing of the bodies. It’s hard to tell if he’s been at it again because these runaways don’t get reported very often. The runaways with homes do, but not the strays this guy’s selected. Doc and I don’t know how he knows they’re without families, but he’s getting information somehow, somewhere. He might have intel on the streets, if he’s a street outlaw, himself. We’re trying to find an angle on him, but it’s still early, and he left no markers with the bodies. No fiber, no hair, no blood or semen. Certainly no fingerprints. The lake might have been his accomplice in ridding the bags of evidence.
Their names were Jacquelyn Martin, 14, Sarah Murphy, 15, Tracy Amber, 13, and Jennifer Daye, 16. The other information on them is scarce. We were only able to ID them because each was a juvenile offender, so they all had prints on file. Otherwise, no one has come forward to claim them.
We’re at White Castle for a morning meal during a days’ shift in early September. The weather is still torrid, even though it’s a week after Labor Day. The kids are back in school, so runaways will be a lot more obvious on the streets.
After we finish our drinks and sliders, we head to Old Town, where three of the four were known to hang, according to Vice. The four of them were known to try and solicit for sex. There are plenty of predators who like them that young, so we’re going to scour the neighborhood and see if anyone saw them in the company of wrong-looking males.
The drive takes thirty minutes in post-rush hour traffic. We cruise the head shops and the doper venues. We stop and ask a young hooker, maybe she’s twenty, if she’ll step into our office, the unmarked Ford four door that might as well have a sign on the sides that reads Cop Ride.
The auburn haired girl steps into the vehicle and sits in the back. She knows the drill, once we showed her ID. You don’t fuck with the Five-Oh, she knows. If they ask for a word, you give it up. Some of our brethren ask a lot more from them, but Doc and I aren’t part of that crew.
She gives us the big smile of cooperation, and then we show her the photos of the dead kids, and the grin is wiped off her face.
“I saw these in the paper.”
“You ever see any of them around the streets?” Doc asks her.
We’re swiveled around so we can see her, our arms draped over the top of the seat.
“Yeah, I think I saw two of them from time to time.”
She puts her finger on the photos of Tracy and Jacquelyn.
“Where?” I ask her.
“Down by the Marquette Theater, two blocks from here.”
“Did you see anyone suspicious looking hanging around them?” Doc asks.
“Yeah, I did.”
“What’d he look like?” I ask.
“Tall. Big shoulders. Like a weight lifter, you know? He was wearin’ a sleeveless tee—you know, a dago-tee. Had kinda long hair, brown, like chesnut. I was walkin’ by, so I wasn’t payin’ much attention.”
“Could you use a twenty?” Doc asks.
“Sure, but it wouldn’t help my memory. Like I said, I was just passin’ by, not payin’ a whole lot of attention.”
She smiles again, but it’s not a smartass pose.
“You never saw this man before or after?” I ask.
“I only saw him the one time, with this Tracy kid. Fuck, they’re hardly kids. More like babies. What kind of sick fuck would kill these?”
Doc gives her his card and tells her to call if she remembers anything else or if she hears anything in the ‘hood. She says she will, but there’s no good humor left on her face.
“I gotta get out of this shit,” she says as a final salvo as she gets out of the car.
We spend the next three hours interviewing a half dozen more working girls, but we come up dry. We try a few of the bars in the area, too, mostly looking for an ID on the male with the long hair and the dago tee, but we come up empty there, as well.
We get out on the streets and spend some leather on the sidewalks, and we stop the occasional pedestrian and ask if they ever saw the girls, and a bag lady type says she saw Tracy and the muscle head, too. She’s gives a pretty detailed account of this guy’s mustache and scraggily short beard, and I think we’ll take her in to see our sketch artist for a rendering. Her name is Martha, the bag lady, and she looks like she might be short of seventy. She doesn’t look well-nourished, either, so when we get her in the car, we take her to a McDonald’s and let her feast on a couple of quarter pounders before we take her downtown to the sketch artist. She tops it all off with a large fries and a large Coke. Doc gives her two twenties and tells her it’s for groceries. I think Martha might tear up, but she doesn’t. She’s too tough for sentiment.
When we pull away from the burger joint, I ask her why she even noticed Tracy and the punk with the hair and facial covering.
“He was much older than her. He must’ve been thirty, maybe.”
“About my age?” I ask.
“You aren’t thirty, are you?” she responds.
“I think you’re trying to hit on my partner, Martha,” Doc smiles back at her in the backseat.
She waves at him and smiles.
“I’m old enough to be his grandma,” she giggles.
“Nah, you’re just a kid,” I tell her.
“I lost my childhood on those fuckin’ streets years ago,” she retorts with a frown.
*
When we get her downtown, Al Macy has a sketch for us a half hour later.
As soon as I look at the rendering, my pulse starts to race.
“What’s the matter, Jimmy?” Doc asks me.
“I think I know this man.”
“You do?”
“He looks just like some kid I went to high school with. At least it’s an older version of the way I think he might appear. Shit, I haven’t seen him in ten, twelve years. He lived in my neighborhood, but after twelfth grade I never saw him again. We didn’t go to high school together, but he was in my seventh and eighth grade class at St. Bonaventure’s. Then I went to a Catholic high school, and I guess he went to the public.
“I heard he was in a gang. It was a Mick outfit on the southside. I think someone told me he’d had his cherry busted a few times. Theft, strong arm, shit like that.”
“What’s his name, Jimmy?”
We’re sitting in my office. We sent Martha home with another two twenties from me. A patrolman gave her a ride back to Old Town.
“His name is Casey McCaslin.”
We locate his address easily enough because he’s on probation for retail theft. He and a few of his close associates grabbed some copper pipes from a chemical factory, and he spent six months in jail. He’s on pro, but the next time he goes away it’s for ten to twenty. Casey McCaslin is a properly slimey thief who’s skipped away from other charges with overly light sentences. Cook County Jail is currently filled to the max with a long waiting list, so non-violent perps are granted short term stays with County because of grievous overcrowding. In other words, he’s a booster on a short leash. He’s never been caught doing the big league stuff, but I always thought he was wrong, even back in grade school. There were some back at school who thought McCaslin was rifling lockers, stealing lunches and more material valuables.
I never knew his family. I never even knew if he had one, but Casey must have because he lived in the neighborhood and he had to have someone footing the bills when he was just a gangster in the bud.
His Irish crew was well known in a mostly Italian neighborhood, where I grew up on the southside. Most of the Micks lived farther south, but there were a few paddies on our block.
Doc and I pay him a visit the next day, the day after the sketch, and we’re two hours into an afternoons’ shift. Surprisingly, he answers the door.
There is a brief look of recognition, once he looks me in the eyes.
He has an apartment on the first floor of a three-flat.
“Don’t I know you?” he smiles. He has that Harp charm in his voice. Probably the same voice he uses on women—maybe young girls, as well.
We show him our IDs. He reads the cards carefully, like he’s done this many times before.
“Jimmy Parisi. Shit, I knew it was you as soon as I looked at you. This makes it official.”
He points to my identification card, next to the shield.
“Shit, a copper. Who’d of figured you’d be a po-lice.”
“Can we talk?” Doc interrupts.
“Sure, step inside.”
I feel my holster on the inside of my sports coat. I’m picturing myself reaching for it on the inside of his apartment.
But when we enter, we see there’s no one else inside, unless they’re hiding in a bedroom or the kitchen. This looks big enough to house two bedrooms. So I’m listening to hear any tell-tale signs of other occupants.
“What can I do you for?” he grins.
I show him Tracy’s picture.
“Yeah?” he asks.
He’s a good actor or he’s never seen her before. There’s no flinch, no flicker of recognition. But I know McCaslin wouldn’t have an obvious tell. He’s been braced too many times previous. He’s got all the moves. You won’t catch him with a blush or a wince or anything. Casey’s too street smart for any of those amateur responses.
“You know any of these others?” Doc presses.
He shows McCaslin the remaining photos.
“No. I don’t recollect seeing or meeting any of these people. Am I supposed to know them?”
“Someone told us they saw you with Tracy,” I say.
“I see a lot of people on the street. If I ever met her, I don’t remember it.”
He motions for us to sit down. He plops onto a bean bag chair, but Doc and I both stand as we were.
“These are the four young girls who were murdered and dumped into the lake in body bags. Didn’t you read about them?” Doc asks.
“I don’t read the papers. It’s the liberal media, you know?” he grins.
“You’re on probation, no?” I ask.
“Jimmy, you didn’t come over here to roust me, did you?” he leers.
“We’re just trying to locate a piece of shit,” I tell him.
Now his face colors, lightly. There’s a rose hue high on his cheeks, at the top of the wells below his green eyes.
“I know you’re not referring to me.”
“Not if you never met this little girl,” I say.
“I never did meet her.”
I watch him a long time. Doc walks around his living room, maybe to distract him out of his comfortable pose on the bean bag chair.
“These things are great for the lower back,” McCaslin tells Doc. “Not so good for fucking, though. Not enough support to keep you from rolling on the floor.”
“What kinds of girls do you bring here?” Doc asks.
“Anything I can get. But nothing as ripe as that girl you showed me. That would be against the law. She can’t be age of consent, can she?”
“No one broke that law. It was just murder,” I tell him.
The blush has receded from his face. Whatever he lost, he’s regained it.
“I don’t do that sort of thing,” he grins.
“You have any sharp knives in here?” Doc asks, standing behind him, now.
“Just kitchen knives,” he turns and says.
“You wouldn’t want to show us, would you?” my partner continues.
“Sure, if you’ve got a warrant.”
“I might use the sap I’m carrying, instead of a warrant,” Doc warns.
“That would be a breach of my rights,” McCaslin spits over his right shoulder.
“Fancy that,” Gibron laughs. “You explaining the law to me.”
“I think you all should leave, now,” McCaslin says, matter-of-fact.
“Yeah, I think so, too,” I tell him.
“Same old Jimmy,” he smiles broadly. “Always the straightest arrow in the quiver.”
“You’d be surprised,” I smile back.
“Don’t hang around with known felons,” Doc reminds him.
“No, I’m going to fucking bible study this very evening.”
We walk out his door and I shut it behind us.
Chapter 3
Mary O’Connor, 1978
I have to wait in the dark and the cold to see her going out to the tavern. She’s a regular, the old bitch is, and she leaves like clockwork from the apartment building at 6:30 almost every night to get her belly full of beer at Fat Jack’s bar, two blocks to the south and two blocks to the west on Blaine Street. She’s a regular, all right. She used to come home and hit me with her fists and with the furniture and with anything not bolted down when she got ripped, and she got bombed every night after she worked at the GE factory on the west side. She stood in a line and screwed screws into the freezer compartments of GE refrigerators. Eight hours of that shit every single day, five days a week, and sometimes on Saturdays if there was overtime. And she couldn’t say no to overtime because she was always being caught short because of her bar bills. Fat Jack’s didn’t let her run up the tab, so she was always broke. Being always broke, when I was around, was just cause to start wailing on me with whatever was available.
I can almost understand why she was mean to me,
but understanding is not excusing the crap she pulled.
She comes scurrying out, suddenly. I’m standing in the gangway between apartment buildings, and there’s no light, so she can’t pick me out, over here.
I still have a key, and I’m praying that she hasn’t changed the lock. But she’s probably too broke to be able to afford a locksmith. When she’s all the way down the block, I head out across the street, unlock the entry, and then make my way up to the third floor apartment.
The old man is in and out of here, depending upon if she lets him crash here with her. He comes over and makes nice with her and gives her a few pokes, and then he wanders off to one of his other “girlfriends.” She won’t divorce the old bastard, so he keeps coming back for more—especially when he runs out of money.
I open the flat’s door on the third floor and I see it’s still pretty much a hive, in here. I had to do the cleaning or I’d be terrified to sit on the shitter for fear of crabs or lice. It was that filthy.
I’m not going to stick around for any longer than I have to, so I go straight for the bedroom. Luck is still riding with me because she hasn’t moved any of my stuff. I have an old athletic bag to cram what I can inside. I’ve been living within a single set of clothes for all the time I’ve been out there. I wash what I have on every two or three days, usually in the sink of a gas station bathroom. It’s no fun wearing clothes that don’t hardly dry very quickly with my body heat.
I hear a sound at the front door, but the front door is the only way out. The windows are nailed shut. She runs the air conditioner when it warms up in spring and summer, so there’s never any fresh air in here, and it smells that way.
Screw it, I tell myself. I walk right into the living room, and there she is. Her hair cascades in wet tangles down to her shoulders because she never bothers drying it. Her winter coat is so threadbare and holey that I almost feel sorry for her, but I remember all the beatings she gave me, and I shit-can the sympathy.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Getting my stuff.”
“Get the hell out. You left, Mary, darlin’, so stay gone.”
“I intend to. I didn’t think you’d be back so soon,” I tell her, my eyes locked on hers with a no-back-down stare.
