NOT AN AMERICAN

by Stanley W Rogouski

  “You two stay here," Muffley said to the first two officers. "You come with me," he said to the third.

  Muffley led the third officer in the direction of Cathy Chegoffgan's apartment, looking around for any sign of Quinn as they walked along. When they reached the Aeolian Harp Building, Muffley squinted. He looked up at the window. It was close to noon. The metal harp threw a short, harsh shadow, and appeared much smaller than it really was. The kitchen light was on.

  "She's home."

  "Who's she?"

  "Just some woman."

  "If Detective Quinn is up there with a woman, do you think he'll want us bothering him?"

  "I'm 100 percent certain Detective Quinn's not up there."

  "But aren't we supposed to be looking for him?"

  "We are checking to make sure."

  "But you said you are sure."

  "I also want to try to see if I can get my keys back."

  "Your keys?"

  "I'll explain later," Muffley said, looking up at the aluminum harp. "Just stay here and don't let anybody in or out of the building. That includes the fire escape."

  "OK sir. I'll call you if I see anything."

  The young officer looked around nervously as Muffley opened the door and walked into the vestibule. He tapped his foot and checked his watch. He looked up at the harp, down along the street, then back up at the harp. He leaned against the side of the building as if he expected a long wait. A few minutes later, Muffley came back out through the front door onto the sidewalk. He bent over, threw up on the ground, wiped his mouth on his sleeve, and took a deep breath. The uniformed officer straightened up, then bent over Muffley and put his hand on his shoulder.

  "Are you OK sir?"

  "I am anything but OK."

  Muffley pulled out his cell phone and dialed, leaning against the front of the building so he wouldn't pass out.

  "Hello. Detective Quinn's been murdered."

  The young officer looked shocked.

  "I want to get a coroner's team down here as soon as possible," Muffley said, continuing to talk into the phone. "I also want to seal off this part of River Gardens. Yes. I'm serious," he shouted. "What the hell is wrong with you people? Why would I joke about something like this? Yes. I want every available officer now. 1848 River Street," he added, "1848 River Street."

  Muffley led the young officer upstairs, the two men gingerly making their way up to the second floor, both looking spooked. When they reached Cathy Chegoffgan's apartment, Muffley stopped the uniformed officer with the back of his hand.

  "Prepare yourself."

  The young officer took a deep breath and readied himself for the ugly sight, but it did little good. As soon as he saw Quinn on the futon with the word "pig" written in his blood on the wall above him, he looked as if he were going to throw up. Muffley grabbed him and pushed him into the hall.

  "Throw up out here. This is a crime scene. We don't want to contaminate it."

  "Oh my God. What kind of monster could have done that?"

  "A young woman lives here. Her boyfriend stops by pretty frequently."

  "So they did it?"

  "God I don't think so. Quinn was a pretty formidable guy. I don't think that little girl or that punk she shacks up with could have done something like this."

  "Then who?" And where are they?"

  "I want to make sure they're not actually in here. I rushed out as soon as I saw Quinn. Are you ready? We're going to go back inside and check for more bodies."

  The officer nodded his head.

  "I'm ready sir."

  "OK let's go then," Muffley said, opening the door. "If you feel you need to puke again, come back out here."

  The two men went back inside the apartment. Muffley checked the kitchen area. The uniformed officer checked the bathroom. Finding no more bodies they walked over to Quinn. Muffley violently shooed away a fly buzzing around his mouth, then walked over to the gallery of photos. The young officer, having called up his reserve of courage, looked over Quinn's body.

  "Could she have had a jealous boyfriend who surprised her and Quinn?" he said.

  "Right now we can't be sure of anything," Muffley said, looking over Cathy Chegoffgan's gallery. "Quinn did like to go on about how she had a boyfriend in MS-13, but I thought that was just blather. Maybe it wasn't."

  He looked down on the ground, and saw the crumpled up photo of Dan Sedgwick. He put it down on the table and straightened it out. He noticed the wastebasket, and reached inside, coming up with the second, larger photo, which he uncrumpled and put down on the table next to the first, smoothing out both with the side of his hand. He walked over to the young officer, one photo in each hand.

  "Here's one possible suspect. People always make obvious mistakes, like subconsciously ripping your own photo down off the wall in the loft where you've just committed a murder."

  He took his cell phone back out and dialed. The officer looked on as he spoke for a few minutes then hung up.

  "Yes. Dan Sedgwick. He got out on bail yesterday."

  "That guy from the Barrio? Kill Detective Quinn? I doubt it."

  "You know him?"

  "Quite well. I doubt he could have done something like this. He was on very good terms with all of us. He was an Iraq War vet."

  "We'll see," Muffley said. We'll see. He made his bail this morning. I've put out an alert."

  The young officer bent over Quinn's body. Like every other young, newly hired officer in Poison Springs, he was intimidated by Quinn's intense gaze and supercilious curve of the mouth. None of that was visible through the half pulped eye sockets and the dark, encrusted blood on the lips. He looked back up at the word "PIG" written in the same dark, encrusted blood. He felt the contents of his stomach trying to come up out of his gullet into his mouth. Muffley grabbed him and pulled him to his feet.

  "Throw up the hallway," he said. "This is a crime scene."

  Chapter 39 - The speech

  Dan Sedgwick had in fact been bailed out of The Dungeon. He walked over to a local diner, ate breakfast, and came back to City Hall, where he observed Elizabeth Felton, John Avellanos, and their entourage of supporters, media, and America's Guard hecklers gather at the bottom of the steps. He made no attempt to speak to any of his old friends, even Jeff Dawson, who was standing on the sidewalk, applauding wildly. When he saw David Sherrod come out of The Barrio to join the end of the rally, he lost himself in the crowd to avoid being seen.

  "Are you ready?" Sherrod said, handing Avellanos a bullhorn.

  Avellanos took the bullhorn.

  "As ready as I'll ever be."

  "Just relax," Sherrod said as they both watched marcher after marcher throw his or her milk carton full of water down on the steps. "You'll do fine."

  "I'm sure I will, "Avellanos said." By this time tomorrow I'm sure I'll be the most hated man in the United States."

  Sherrod laughed.

  "Ah, don't worry. We all get nervous the first few times we have to talk in front of a crowd. But don't worry. We've gone over this 1000 times. People are tired and most of the media is gone. So consider this a dry run for future speaking engagements. OK. Let's go."

  John Avellanos walked to the top of the steps with the bullhorn in one hand and his milk carton full of water in the other. He poured the water from his milk carton down on the steps. He turned on the bullhorn, and turned the volume up so the feedback could call the crowd to attention.

  "Some of you know me as the man who stopped an out of control mob from injuring two Poison Springs Metro Police officers. Other people know me as the brother of our next mayor. Still other people know me an activist in David Sherrod's group United Coalition Against Xenophobia, or the son of a long serving member of the United States Senate. But what most of you don't know about me is that for several weeks, I actually lived inside Winterborn II."

  He looked around to notice how few police officers there seemed to be.

  "Yes that's technically trespassing," he said, "but if a
ny of Poison Springs' finest choose to arrest me, ask yourself why. What don't they want you to hear?"

  Avellanos looked down at the Barrio. There was no police line on the west side of Reagan Plaza. There were somewhere between 500 and 1000 people on the steps of City Hall. But Sherrod was right. Most of them appeared to be tired and worn out after having marched from Winterborn II to Reagan Plaza, and weren't really listening. Only the local TV reporter and the America's Guard hecklers seemed to care.

  "Last year at this time, I was homeless," he continued. "I had never seen Poison Springs before, even though my family has a long, distinguished history in the public life of the city. I had no money. I had no identification. I had no place to go. I had no place to sleep. So one rainy night, I wandered onto what I thought was a closed shopping mall to spend the night under the awning only to find that it was an abandoned shopping mall that had plenty of free, vacant apartments complete with running water. Just about the only thing it lacked was heat."

  He tapped the bullhorn and looked ahead of him to see photographers taking photos and the TV news crew continuing to film.

  "But it did have heat. As I explored that great, abandoned construction site, I found that the ground beneath my feet wasn't as stable as I thought it would be. Oh, I knew a little about the ancient history of Poison Springs, about how it used to be the largest producer of anthracite coal in the world, about how it collapsed into an economic depression in the 1950s, about how they cleaned up all the mine fires in the 1970s. I also knew about that fire all the way up on West Hill under the old coal breaker. What I didn't know about was the fire on the other side of the construction site itself, near that so called accident. I found a stretch of fence about 100 feet around. Inside, I found more heat than I wanted, heat and an overpowering smell of sulfur. Not only has the West Hill Mine fire spread to the perimeter of Winterborn II. It's in Winterborn II. It's not only contaminating the water supply. It's headed right towards Route 1081.”

  "Liar," a voice from the margins of the crowd boomed. "Liar."

  Avellanos looked over to see one of the America's Guard members who had been shadowing the march, the same man who had drank off the gallon of contaminated water.

  "That chain link fence wasn't there last year," he said. "So you're a god damned little communist liar."

  The TV reporter looked surprised. She turned her attention away from Avellanos to the three America's Guard members. The cameraman followed along and continued to film.

  "So you're saying the fire actually has spread to Winterborn II? This I will run."

  "I didn't say that. I said the fence he's talking about wasn't there. There's no fire there."

  Avellanos took a step towards the heckler.

  "Then what did I see? What did I smell?"

  "I don't know. Maybe you should take a bath and get a job.

  Avellanos forced out an exaggerated laugh.

  "You're a funny little man aren't you? But you picked the wrong day to fuck with me."

  "There's that liberal tolerance and nonviolence."

  "Come up here and get a fistful of liberal tolerance. I'll snap your fucking neck. I'll carry you out to Winterborn II, and I'll throw you into that mine fire that supposedly hasn't spread all by myself. And nobody will know any better. If you want to commit the perfect murder, that's the place. Amelia Earhart, I bet she's there. Jimmy Hoffa, I'm sure he's there too. I used to think the best way to dispose of the body of a man you just murdered would be to put it in a plastic barrel and soak it in hydrochloric acid. But in this town? Just go to Winterborn II, walk across the parking lot, pull apart some chain link fence, and throw your murder victim down into Michael Catalinelli's flaming pit of hell."

  A great roar of laughter went up from the crowd. Even the America's Guard hecklers tried to suppress a giggle, but Elizabeth Felton frowned. She pulled David Sherrod aside and whispered in his ear.

  "David. I thought you were going to coach him through writing his speech. This is terrible."

  "That's not in the script."

  Felton sighed.

  "I've never seen him like this. He tried to warn us that he couldn't speak in public. But we just had to shove him up there, didn't we? It's our fault. Find a way to shut him down, for his own sake. He used profanity so it won't make it onto the news, thank God."

  Sherrod nodded. He worked his way through the crowd and put his hand on Avellanos's shoulder.

  "Hey," he whispered in his ear. "The permit expires in 15 minutes and your sister wants to make a few final remarks."

  Avellanos gave the bullhorn to David Sherrod.

  "OK," he said. "I've made my point."

  "We'll talk later," Sherrod said, patting him on his shoulder.

  Elizabeth Felton took the bullhorn and began to speak, trying to explain why 500 people had marched three miles with gallon sized milk cartons full of water, about the old factories that used to sit at the foot of West Hill, about how they had sent a gallon of water to a laboratory at a local university to be analyzed. The people on the stairs, as well as the media, began to pay attention. When she was confident that she had put the rally back on track, she began to wind it down.

  John Avellanos had taken advantage of his cousin's speech to fade back into the crowd before anybody could approach him. He put his hand on Quinn's 9mm pistol and looked up at the staircase. There were no police officers at all. The way was clear. The doors were open, and all he had was about a 100 yard dash to get inside.

  Where were the police?

  Chapter 40 - Cop Killer

  A large crowd of police officers, well over 100, milled about underneath the Aeolian Harp Building, constantly being augmented as car after car came to a stop on River Street. Peter Muffley waited inside for the coroner and the homicide detectives. The shock of finding Steven Quinn's body along with his discovery of the crumpled up photo in the wastebasket had convinced him that Dan Sedgwick had committed the murder. The young officer who had come up to Cathy Chegoffgan's apartment with him was just as convinced he had not.

  "So you don't think he's violent?" Muffley said.

  "Absolutely not," the officer said. "He may be a deadbeat, but he kept that place from getting out of hand. He's a peacemaker, basically. Oh he's a bit of a deadbeat, but he's a likable guy."

  "Really? We'll see. I only hope those two poor kids are OK."

  He laughed grimly to himself.

  "I need to find out if one of them still has my keys."

  The young officer looked up, still puzzled at the mention of the keys.

  "Keys?"

  "Oh never mind. If the worst happens, I'll be saved that problem at least."

  Muffley walked over to the door when he heard a knock. There he found two more uniformed officers and a man in a cheap suit from WillyMart. He walked out into the hallway and closed the door behind him.

  "Detective Muffley?" the plainclothesman said, extending his hand. "I'm Dr. Skelton."

  Muffley shook his hand.

  "Peter Muffley."

  "You don't look too good detective."

  "There's a dead body inside. How do you expect me to look?"

  "I've been looking at dead bodies since before you were born. Don't worry. They don't bite."

  "This is a cop's body."

  "They all look alike to me."

  Muffley screwed his face up into an expression of disgust. He looked as if he were about to have an emotional outburst, but he paused, and managed to calm himself down. He turned his back to Dr. Skelton and addressed himself to the two uniformed officers.

  "Are they sealing off the block?"

  "The entire police force is within 100 yards of where we stand."

  "OK prepare yourself. What you are about to see is a very, very ugly sight."

  Muffley opened the door, grimacing as he heard Skelton chuckling over what he seemed to think his hysteria. He led the two uniformed officers over to Quinn's body. Skelton walked over and shooed away a fly. He leaned over, trying to
maintain his air of cynical unconcern, but the expression on his face indicated that even he was a little disturbed.

  "This is quite a sight," he said, taking a deep breath and pinching Quinn's hand. "It looks like he's been here for most of the night."

  Skelton looked up at the word "PIG" splashed across the wall in Quinn's blood.

  "Detective Muffley. I have never met Detective Quinn, but I think he deserves better than this. Why hasn't someone washed that off the wall? Please. Would somebody please cover that up?"

  "It's evidence."

  "Well photograph it and then scrub it.''

  "We need you to take a sample of it first."

  "Sir," one of the uniformed officers said to Muffley. "Sir."

  "What is it?"

  "You need to see this."

  "Show me."

  The officer held up Quinn's smart phone and the battery.

  “I found this right next to the body."

  The young officer handed the phone and the battery to Muffley. Muffley put the battery back into the phone, checked Quinn's calls, then switched on the video. An expression of horror came over his face as it started to play. Behind Quinn, the young officer who had found the smart phone craned his neck to get a better look. Muffley handed him Quinn's phone and took out his own. His hands were shaking so violently, he dropped it, picked it up, and dropped it again. Finally, he managed to punch in a number.

  "Don't let anybody inside City Hall," he shouted, after a pause. "Don't let anybody inside City Hall."

  "Who the hell is that in the video?" the young officer shouted.

  "What do you mean you don't have any cops in the area?" Muffley shouted into the phone. "Get some now. Seal off City Hall now."

  "Do you know that man in the video?"

  Muffley ignored him and bolted towards the door.

  “Everybody listen to me," he shouted. "Everybody listen to me."

  "What's going on?" another one of the officers said.

  "We need to get down to Reagan Plaza now," Muffley shouted. "We need to get down to Reagan Plaza now."

  He tripped and banged his head on the door frame. He sat down on the floor and screamed in pain.