Sacrificial Ground

by Thomas H. Cook

  “Have any idea where he did time?”

  “He talks funny,” Luther said. “Sort of like Johnson used to, Texas-like. Maybe that’s where they busted him.” He picked up a soiled magazine and fanned himself languidly. “Lord, it’s hot in here.” He glanced at Caleb. “You remember S. D. Pullens? He used to explode them little fireballs in his mouth?”

  “Yeah, I do,” Caleb said.

  “He got the chair up in Illinois.”

  “Pullens?” Caleb asked unbelievingly. “What for?”

  “He was working one of them factories up there, and he just got roaring drunk. Cops come to cool things down, and he shot two of them.” He squinted hard. “I wouldn’t have figured him for that, would you?”

  “The drinking, but not the killing,” Caleb said.

  Luther shook his head wearily. “When things turn sour, anything can happen. I guess that’s all you can say.” He dropped the magazine into a rusty fifty-gallon drum. “Fanning don’t do no good.” He looked longingly at the square of light which came through the single open door of the shed. “What say we go on back outside.”

  The heat remained stifling even outside the shed, and Caleb pulled off his jacket and slung it over his shoulder.

  “This Davon character, did he say anything to you, Luther?”

  Luther thought about it for a moment. “I just noticed one thing.”

  “What was that?”

  “He didn’t try to get me down,” Luther said. “Minute I give him a price, he took it.” He looked at Frank. “This ain’t Woolworth’s. People usually bitch and moan about the price, and I come up a little, and the next guy comes down. Not Little, though. Not this time. I quoted him about half what I’d have paid him on the up and up, and he looked glad to have it.”

  Frank wrote it down.

  “He must have figured they was a APB on it by now,” Luther said, “so he just wanted to dump it. Cutter is the best place. A fence don’t want no fucked-up car.” He shook his head. “Shit, I wouldn’t have bought it either if I’d read the paper yesterday.” He laughed. “But I don’t ever get to the paper till the next day. When it comes to the news, I’m always a day late.”

  “Did he say anything at all about the car?” Frank asked.

  “They’s nothing to say,” Luther told him. “I know my business, so nobody bullshits me. Besides, I ain’t buying it to take a long vacation in.” He nodded back toward the shed. “Them cars in there, they’ll be down to parts before morning. I mean right down to parts, nothing but bumpers and carburetors and shit like that.” He looked affectionately at Caleb. “Could have been the same with that little BMW, too.”

  “I know it could, Luther,” Caleb said quietly.

  Luther turned back to Frank. “I’m a car cutter, and I’m a good one, but I don’t have nothing to do with no real meanness, and that’s a fact. Anybody hurts a little girl, they deserve what they get.” He glanced back toward Caleb. “They deserve it a hell of a lot more than S. D. Pullens did, I bet.”

  Frank pulled out his card and offered it to Luther.

  Luther didn’t move to take it. “I just deal with Caleb,” he said flatly.

  Frank put the card back in his pocket. “I appreciate it,” he said.

  Caleb laughed. “Well, Luther, I’d tell you stay out of trouble, but shit, I know better than that.” He pulled on his jacket. “You know where to find me.”

  “Tell your boys to come get this fucking car out of here,” Luther said. “Some people I deal with would get pretty bent out of joint if they come driving up and saw a goddamn police tow truck.”

  “It’ll be here fast, Luther,” Caleb said. “I guarantee it.”

  Luther rubbed his sleeve across his face. “And do something about this fucking heat while you’re at it,” he said.

  13

  The drive back to headquarters struck Frank as unbearably long, and as the first grayish outline of the city became visible, he felt an urge to turn away from it and drive in the opposite direction, it didn’t matter where. Just someplace where he didn’t know the pimps or the whores, or even that fresh-faced young traffic cop who waved him through the late-afternoon congestion. He wanted to be a stranger, a silent, invisible presence, nothing more.

  A full sheet had already been run on Davon Little by the time they got back to the bullpen. Gibbons was waving it playfully in his hand when Frank and Caleb came through the door.

  “This looks hot,” he said with a boyish smile.

  Frank snatched it from his hand. “We don’t know yet.”

  Gibbons looked at him doubtfully. “You’d let me know if you needed something, I hope.”

  “Sure thing,” Caleb said as he passed by and followed Frank quickly to his desk.

  “Davon Clinton Little,” Frank said to himself as he began to read the report.

  Caleb stood over him, his eyes fixed on the paper.

  “Uh huh,” he said, after a moment. “Lots of petty shit. Burglary in his youth, then graduating to a little personal assault.”

  “He drew some time on that,” Frank said.

  “Yeah, and it looks like it settled him down a little,” Caleb added. “So he switched over to flim-flams and car theft.” He smiled. “Before long we’ll be dealing with white-collar crime.”

  “Slid back in eighty-two,” Frank said.

  “And things got raw, didn’t they?” Caleb said.

  Frank ticked off the descent. “Armed robbery, assault, attempted murder.”

  “He’s not mellowing with age, Frank,” Caleb warned darkly.

  Frank nodded. “Last known address was on the Southside.” He took a map of the city and spread it out across his desk. “Simpson Street.” He found the street name in the index then pinpointed it on the map. “Look at this.”

  Caleb leaned forward, eyeing the map. He watched as Frank’s finger moved left about a quarter of an inch and struck the corner of Amsterdam and Glenwood, the vacant lot where Angelica’s body had been found.

  “Bingo,” he whispered.

  Frank stood up. “Well, let’s go see if he’s home.”

  “When you get older, it’s all memory,” Caleb said as he pulled himself into the car.

  Frank hit the ignition and eased the car from the curb. “What is?”

  “Life,” Caleb answered. “Like since we found that girl, I’ve been thinking of all the other bodies. I can remember the first one the best.” He pulled out his pipe and began to fill the bowl. “It was on the Southside, too, and it was a young girl. But there was a difference. She’d been buried quite a while, and, you know, Frank, the thing I remember most is how she kept coming apart when they tried to dig her out. Pieces of her would just crumble in your hand.” He shook his head. “And I thought, well, the preacher back home, he got one thing right: dust to dust, Frank, that’s a fact.” He put the pipe in his mouth and lit it.

  Frank glanced over at him, and for some reason his eyes lingered on Caleb’s face. It was large and jowled. Skin hung flaccidly from the line of his jaw and gathered in rounded puffs beneath his eyes. He was nearly sixty, Frank guessed, and it was as if he could see the thread of his life as it unraveled, hear each fiber as it snapped.

  “Now my wife has a different idea,” Caleb said after a moment. “Sort of a Holy Roller type. She thinks she’s on her way to God.”

  Frank continued to listen. He was surprised that after so many years, Caleb had suddenly begun to talk about his private life. It was as if there was something in him trying to break out, a small, trapped animal gnawing through his skin.

  “She was always off to church,” Caleb went on. “Praying we could have a kid, that’s what I always figured.” He glanced over to Frank. “I don’t know why we couldn’t. We tried plenty during the first few years.” He smiled ruefully. “Then we didn’t try that much anymore.”

  Frank felt himself overtaken by a deep sadness, like a fist out of the darkness, and he had to turn away quickly and fix his eyes on the street ahead in o
rder to keep himself contained. Caleb seemed to sense it, and said nothing else. He simply sat, puffing on his pipe, and watched the line of shops and restaurants until they faded almost imperceptibly into the dilapidated service stations and fast-food joints of the Southside.

  “Okay, let’s keep our eyes open for Simpson Street,” Frank said after they’d gone past the vacant lot.

  “Should be on our right,” Caleb said matter-of-factly.

  It was a narrow, pitted street, and the car rumbled noisily as Frank turned onto it.

  “Go slow, now,” Caleb said. “We’re looking for Two Forty-one.” He peered out the window, his eyes darting from one house to the next. “There it is,” he said, finally.

  Frank guided the car over to the curb and stopped. The house was small and rested on a cement foundation. The red brick facade was chipped, and even from that distance, Frank could see a large tear in the front screen door. A scattering of children’s toys lay here and there on the parched lawn.

  Caleb’s eyes moved from the overturned tricycle to the rusting swings. “I don’t like kids around when we’re checking a guy out.” He looked at Frank. “Guys like Little, what the fuck do they want kids for?”

  Frank got out of the car and joined Caleb on the sidewalk, then the two of them walked to the front door and knocked.

  It opened immediately, and a tall thin woman with stringy blonde hair stood facing them. She was dressed in faded jeans and what Frank took to be the upper half of a flowered bikini. She was very pale, and her arms dangled at her sides like strips of white paint.

  “Davon ain’t here,” she said. She raked back her hair with a single, boney hand. “I don’t know when he’ll be back.” A small child in a soiled diaper toddled up from behind and wrapped its arms around her leg. “Get away now,” the woman said. She reached down, jerked the child around and shoved it back toward the rear of the house. “This ain’t your business.”

  Frank pulled out his badge. “Where is Mr. Little?” he asked.

  The woman stared vacantly at the badge.

  “Where is he?” Caleb demanded in a hard voice.

  The woman’s watery blue eyes shifted over to Caleb. “I don’t got to say nothing to you.”

  “We’re investigating a murder,” Frank told her.

  A thin smile slithered across her lips. “He killed somebody? I figured he would someday.”

  “We just want to talk to him,” Frank said. He pocketed his badge. “Now where is he?”

  “The park.”

  “Grant Park?”

  “Yeah,” the woman said. “But you don’t tell him I told you so, you hear?”

  “Where in the park?” Caleb asked.

  “Said he was going to the zoo. Said he was meeting somebody over there. He’s a liar, though. He could be anywhere. Sometimes he don’t come home. He just leaves me with the kids, and he just goes wherever he wants to.” She stepped back from the door. “You find him. I ain’t looking for him no more.” She closed the door.

  It was only a short drive to the park, and Caleb and Frank rode silently together until they reached the entrance.

  Frank took out the mug shot which had been attached to the report. “Want to look at this again?”

  Caleb shook his head. “Nah. Once I see a face, I got it forever.”

  Frank looked at the picture for a moment, then returned it to his pocket.

  They spotted him almost at once, a tall black man in a pair of bright yellow pants and a short-sleeve flamingo shirt.

  Caleb chuckled to himself. “With a record like his, you’d think he’d try to look a little less conspicuous.”

  Frank nodded.

  “You know, when it comes to guys like Little, we got one advantage, Frank: they’re even stupider than we are.”

  In the distance, Frank could see Davon Little as he slumped against the short storm fence. Beyond the fence there was a moat, and beyond that a small concrete island where two enormous polar bears yawned in the heat.

  Little stared off toward a clump of trees in the distance, then straightened himself and moved on down along the storm fence, pausing for a moment at the grizzly bears.

  “Swear to God, Frank,” Caleb said, “he looks like he’s here for the pleasure of it.”

  A short distance away, Frank could see another man lingering by the fence. He wore purple corduroy pants and an open-collared shirt of bright yellow. He had a hot dog in one hand, and a can of soda in the other.

  “I think we may have stumbled on to a drug deal, Caleb,” he said.

  Caleb peered at the man in the yellow shirt. “That’s Jimmy Swift,” he said. He smiled. “I bet you a big steak dinner that he’s going to mosey over to Davon, chat with him real casual for a moment, and then offer him a sip of that soda. It’ll all look just fine, except poor Jimmy won’t get that soda back.”

  “And inside the can …” Frank said.

  “… little bag of cocaine wrapped up real tight.”

  “How does he get the payment to Swift?”

  “Probably already dropped it off somewhere,” Caleb said. He smiled. “Just watch your line of fire if things get hot. We don’t want to waste a polar bear.”

  Together they moved forward slowly. Almost at the same time, Swift and Little came together at the edge of the bear cages, talked for a moment, then, just as Caleb had predicted, Swift gave Little his can of soda. Little took a swig, smiled, nodded, but did not give the can back to his friend.

  “See there,” Caleb said quickly. “Little must be losing his grip to use such an old trick.”

  Swift walked away, leaving Little once again leaning against the fence. He watched the bears for a moment, took another sip from the can, then moved on, sauntering casually along the winding path that led to the reptile house.

  “We’ll get as close as we can without getting burned,” Caleb said.

  For the next few minutes they kept pace with Little. Caleb circled to the left, Frank to the right, widening the space between them.

  The crowds which were gathered around the bear cages had thinned along the uphill walk to the reptile house, and Frank and Caleb waited for the moment when Little would be most in the clear.

  It occurred only a few yards from the entrance to the reptile house, and Frank and Caleb seized the opportunity immediately, rushing quickly up to him, one on his left side, the other on his right.

  “Morning, Davon,” Caleb said. He dug his fingers into Little’s upper arm. “Show Mr. Little your badge, Frank.”

  Little looked glumly at Frank’s badge. “What’s this all about, man?”

  Caleb smiled. “God, it’s hot in the zoo today,” he said. “Hey, Davon, how about you give me a taste of that R.C?”

  Little’s face stiffened. “It’s all drunk up.”

  “Really?” Caleb asked. “Maybe just the last few drops then?” He snatched the can from Little’s fingers. “Feels like there’s some left.”

  Little’s eyes darted from Frank to Caleb, then back to Caleb. “Small-time, man. I ain’t a big horse.”

  Caleb shrugged. “We don’t mind a pony, do we, Frank?”

  Frank shook his head. “How long have you been living in this area, Mr. Little?”

  “Few years, why?”

  Frank pulled out a picture of Angelica. “You ever seen this girl?”

  Little glared at the picture. “I don’t hunker down with no white pussy.” He cocked his head proudly. “Plenty of dark meat without it”

  “Like that woman you’re living with?” Caleb asked.

  Little said nothing.

  “Or is she your cousin?”

  “She nothing to me, man,” Little said. “A friend of mine dropped her off on me. Left her and them screaming kids.” He shook his head. “I ain’t got the heart to kick them out, that’s all.”

  Frank jerked the picture up toward Little’s face. “Have you ever seen this girl?” he asked sternly.

  “No, I ain’t never seen her.”

&nb
sp; “What about a red BMW?” Caleb said. “Ever seen one of them?”

  Little let out a long, slow breath. “Shit.”

  “Where’d you get that car, Davon?”

  “I found it.”

  “It’s not exactly the same thing as a penny lying in the gutter,” Frank told him.

  “Well, that’s the way it is, though,” Little said. “I didn’t break into it or nothing.” He looked desperately at Caleb. “You can tell I didn’t. They ain’t a mark on that car.” He laughed. “I mean it was just sitting there, man, with the keys in the ignition, the windows all rolled down.”

  “Where was it?” Frank asked.

  “Not far from here.”

  Frank took out his notebook. “Where, exactly?”

  “At the edge of the park,” Little said. “It was just sitting there one morning.”

  “Which edge of the park?”

  “Sydney Street,” Little said. “Right where it meets Boulevard. Right on that corner.”

  Frank wrote it down. “When was this?”

  “Three days ago.”

  “In the morning, you said?”

  “I was out walking,” Little added. He looked at Caleb. “That’s the truth. I wasn’t looking for nothing. It was just there.”

  “What time in the morning?” Frank asked.

  “Must have been about four.”

  “Was it still dark?”

  “Just turning light.”

  “Odd time for a stroll, Davon,” Caleb said.

  Davon glared at him. “Ain’t no law against it.”

  Caleb waved the can in front of him. “Well, we got something else.”

  Davon looked at him sourly. “Lucky punch,” he said knowingly. “You didn’t get a clean bust. You just bumped into it.”

  “That don’t matter to the judge,” Caleb reminded him.

  Davon smiled contemptuously. “Bust me fine, I do the time.”

  “A poet,” Caleb said with a grin.

  “Do me bad, I make you sad.”

  Suddenly a streak of anger flashed over Caleb’s face. He grabbed Little by the shirt and wrenched him forward. “Listen to me, you little shit, you’re a thief and a pimp, and in your whole goddamn life you haven’t done one good thing.” His voice hardened and grew cold. “You fuck with me, and I’ll go through you like a spear.” He let him go, and Little stumbled backward slightly.