Face Blind

by Len Melvin

  “Okay,” Beaux said, almost in a whisper. “Okay.”

  Malouf nodded at the man. The man hesitated, shook his head in apparent disapproval, then reached into a brown pouch attached to his belt. He pulled a large, green pill from it and held it up to Beaux. “Take this.”

  Malouf grabbed a bottle of water from the counter and put it on the table.

  Beaux took the pill from the man and put it in her mouth. She picked up the bottle, took a sip of water, and gulped down the pill.

  “You’re going to feel really good in a couple of minutes,” Malouf said.

  Beaux set the bottle back on the table. “So what is this mission thing you’re talking about? And what rules? And what things could be changed?” Beaux looked at the men in the room and then at Malouf. “Who are you guys?”

  The men were silent and each looked at Malouf. “I told you we make documentaries.” Malouf said. He motioned to the man standing next to the door. “He’s just saying that our boss might not be happy that we were involved in things other than filming.” Beaux’s eyes narrowed in doubt. “He’d rather we were behind the camera instead of in front of it.” Malouf held out his hands, palms upward in explanation. “That’s all.”

  “I don’t believe you.” And then Beaux started smiling. “I don’t fucking believe you.” And then she began laughing. “You are all so weird.”

  “I think she’s ready,” Malouf said.

  The man hesitated, reached into his belt bag and drew out a tube of cream. He unscrewed the top, squirted a long line onto his palm, then began rubbing ointment across Beaux’s arm.

  “So fucking weird,” Beaux smiled and looked at Malouf. The man took a needle and silk thread from his pouch, then threaded the needle and wove the thread between edges of skin on either side of Beaux’s wound. “So fucking weird,” Beaux mumbled. “How come you’re not doing the stitches,” she asked Malouf in a dull monotone voice.

  “He’s better at it.” Malouf said. “How do you feel?”

  “I feel fucking good,” Beaux said, her smile taking on a dreamlike quality.

  Malouf noticed that even the men in the room were smiling. “Good. When he’s through stitching, I’ll rub some magic cream over the wound.”

  “Thanks, Malouf. So fucking weird,” she mumbled again and closed her eyes.

  ◆◆◆

  Beaux woke with a start, wondering where she was. She threw the blanket that covered her to the side and sat up in bed. Malouf sat in a chair, eating an orange, typing on a laptop. She put a hand to her brow and then remembered her injury.

  She held her arm out straight and ran her hand down its length. There was a thin, barely discernible red line where the wound had been. She glanced at Malouf and then back at the red line. She ran her hand again across the smooth surface of her arm and looked back at Malouf who was smiling. He closed the laptop and put a wedge of the orange in his mouth. “Wound healed okay?”

  Beaux held up her arm. “How did you do that?”

  “I told you I had some magic cream.”

  Beaux stared at him for a moment and then looked around the room. “What time is it? Where’s my phone?”

  Malouf pointed to the chair where her clothes were folded. “Maybe over there.”

  Beaux saw she was wearing a blouse and felt under the covers for clothing. Her fingers brushed against the fabric of her underwear and she let out a deep sigh. She jumped out of bed and hurriedly put her pants on. “Who took my pants off of me last night?”

  Malouf raised his hand. “I wanted you to be comfortable.”

  “Just so it wasn’t one of those creepy guys you hang out with.” Beaux put her shirt over her head, slipped her arms into the sleeves and looked for her shoes. She took the phone from the pocket of her pants and scanned the screen. “My mom’s probably worried sick. I’ve got like twenty messages.” She found her shoes and stepped quickly into them. “And I’m late for work. I’ve got to work a double today.” Beaux stopped and saw Malouf was watching her, the orange held in front of him. “You like oranges, I see.”

  “They’re hard to get where I come from.”

  “In L.A?” Beaux folded her arms over her chest. “We are going to have to have a talk.”

  “About what?”

  “Everything.” Beaux hurried to the door, opened it, then abruptly went back to him and sat on one of his legs. She put a hand on either side of his face and brought him toward her. She kissed him on the forehead and then sat back, her hands still on either cheek. “Thanks for last night.”

  “Welcome.” Beaux sat for a moment and then rose and strode to the door. “You know, you saved me last night also.” Malouf took another bite of the orange.

  Beaux held the door open as she turned back to him. “I guess we’re good together.”

  “Could be.”

  “Come by the restaurant tonight. Drinks and dinner are on the house.”

  “I won’t have to fight, will I?”

  “Just bring that baton. And like I said, we need to talk.”

  “About what?”

  “About everything. About who you are. About that cool black baton and your magic cream. About the,” and Beaux made quotes with her fingers, “mission. About you stalking those guys.” Beaux held her arm out and pointed to the faint red line. “About this.” She lowered her arm. “And us.” She grabbed the door handle. “See you tonight?”

  “Sure.”

  “And also about that golden light that keeps going off when you’re watching those guys.”

  Malouf froze, the orange in his hand ignored. “What?”

  “The gold light that keeps flashing when those guys are about to go underground.”

  “What do you mean keeps flashing?” Malouf spoke slowly.

  “Well, I’ve seen it flash twice, once when you weren’t there. I think it was when you were in New Orleans.”

  Malouf stared at Beaux. “Twice?”

  Beaux nodded. “Yeah.”

  “Goddammit.” He stood and walked to the window and gazed out at the town. “Goddammit,” he said under his breath. He turned slowly to Beaux. “What happened the second time it flashed? The time I was in New Orleans.”

  “It scared them pretty badly. They got underground quick.” Beaux said. “Why did you go to New Orleans anyway?”

  “I’ve never been and always wanted to go and if I didn’t go now…” Malouf left the sentence unfinished. “And I thought the guys could carry on without me.” Malouf finished the orange and threw the peels into the wastebasket. “Apparently, I was wrong.”

  “Okay, I got to go.” She waved, shut the door and ran down the hall.

  Malouf began peeling another orange and stared at the door. He stood and went to the window and watched Beaux sprint down the street. There was a sharp knock at the door. “Yeah?”

  One of the men entered. “I saw her leave. Was she okay? How was her arm?”

  “She’s fine. That was good work you did.”

  “Thanks. It was actually interesting to see someone take the green pill for the first time.”

  Malouf nodded. “It was.”

  “I think we should go to work.”

  Malouf was instantly alert. “Why?”

  “There’s a lot of activity in town and on the grounds of the campus.”

  “Activity?”

  “I think Federal agents.”

  Malouf grabbed his jacket. “Let’s go.”

  “What about the girl?”

  Malouf stopped and stared at the man. That was an unusual question from one of them. “What?”

  “What are you going to do about the girl. She knows a lot, apparently. And like you said earlier, she’s smart.”

  “Don’t worry.” He took a slice from the orange and put it in his mouth. “Nothing’s going to get in the way of the mission.”

  Chapter Eleven

  The pasty-skinned man waited until the clerk turned her head and then slipped a bracelet into his pocket. Simon pushed aside
the half-eaten plate of fish and chips and focused his attention on the monitor. He went through the series of low-resolution screen grabs, the pixelated face, clean-cut and distinguished, a perfect foil that would allay any suspicions of a salesperson in an elegant boutique. Simon had been scouring the database for clean-cut male shoplifters and was startled at the number of images of the man that he came across. “Nigel, tell me what you think of this. I think I got an ident on our jewelry store shoplifter.”

  Nigel took a bite of his sandwich, turned down the Pink Floyd that played on his computer from the time he arrived at work until the moment he left, and wheeled his chair across the room, sliding into a spot just over Simon’s shoulder. “Un-huh,” he mumbled as Simon put one image after another on the screen. “Uh-huh.”

  “I cross-referenced the image with the term ‘clean-cut white male shoplifters.’ This guy has been busy.”

  “Christ, how many jobs has he done?”

  “I’m up to about thirty right now. And he’s not particular. Just that it’s a luxury item.”

  “Bloody hell. Is that a Burberry cashmere coat he just pinched?” Nigel wiped a sleeve across his mouth. “And look, he’s wearing the same scarf in every photo.”

  “Yep. That’s right.” Simon glanced over his shoulder. “How can people be so dumb as to wear the same clothes at every crime?”

  “‘Crime Clothes’ is what we call it. If you do something and get away with it, you’re not going to change. It’s almost a good luck charm. Plus, lots of these blokes, especially when they’re successful, don’t feel like they’re gonna get nicked.” Nigel wheeled his chair back in front of his computer and picked up the half-eaten sandwich. “Notify Eliot about the ident and run it by him.”

  “Okay.” Eliot was the head of their division. A burly, short-necked, ruddy-faced man, always in rumpled clothes, he had begun as a street cop and then later on worked in the plainclothes division. He had realized that as he was walking the street, he could spot faces and immediately know where he had seen them, what they had been wearing and who they were. When the Super-Recognizer Unit had been assembled, he had immediately volunteered. He had been one of the first assigned to the Unit and was known for his prowess for making identifications. All idents had to be run by him before they were entered into the central database.

  The printer whirred as Simon clicked on multiple images. Simon picked the screen grabs from the printer and headed upstairs to put the pictures in front of Leanda’s uncle.

  Eliot grunted as Simon knocked on the open door. He glanced up from the magnifying glass that hovered over the image in front of him and motioned for Simon to come in. Simon spread the images out over Eliot’s desk and plopped into a chair by the desk. “Who’s this?”

  “A guy who likes luxury items. And lots of them, apparently.”

  Eliot flipped through the images, occasionally returning back to the first one, his face inches above the pictures. He picked up the magnifying glass and repeated the procedure. “How many idents you have here?” Eliot murmured with an accent borne of his native Yorkshire.

  “Almost thirty.” Simon sat forward in his seat, used to not understanding Eliot when he spoke.

  “Some of these proportions are stretched. And the chin looks narrower on some of the images.” Eliot lowered the magnifying glass. “Do you have the original videos? I want to see his gait and his face from different angles.”

  “Look at the scarf. It’s the same in every photo.”

  Eliot’s head dipped and he mumbled to himself as he again went from one photo to another. He let out a deep breath and stood, his girth casting a shadow onto the pictures. “Let me run it by Peter. It looks like the same bloke but let’s be sure before it goes into the central database.” All idents had to be subjected to peer review for an independent judgment. “I’ll let you know.”

  “Okay.” Simon rose to leave. “I’ll get the videos for you to look at, just to make sure.”

  Eliot grunted again, dropped back into his seat and picked up the magnifying glass, returning his attention to the photos he had been studying before Simon came in. “Hey, how’s my sweet niece doing?” Eliot asked without looking up.

  “Good. We’re taking the train to Doncaster this weekend for the horse races.”

  Eliot laid the magnifying glass down and held the photo up to the light. He put a finger on the photo and ran it slowly across the image. “Hmm,” he muttered. He put his hand on either side of his chin and stroked it in a deliberate manner. “Good.”

  Simon hesitated not knowing whether the ‘Good’ was about the races or the image held in Eliot’s hand. He smiled and then slipped through the door. Simon was sure that the image in the photos was the same guy and he felt Eliot also knew, but peer review was a rule. Because even the super-recognizers were wrong sometimes.

  ◆◆◆

  He’d had a long week, searching databases, peering at images for hours, playing the grainy videos over and over, looking for anything that might lend a clue to a crime. Simon sat back in his chair and yawned. He rubbed his eyes and returned his attention to the video in front of him. An older man in a dark overcoat and a brown, wool-felt bowler hat had been groping young girls on double-decker buses in the Kensington area. The man wore the hat down over his face, and he kept his head lowered, obscuring the top part of his face so that all that was visible was a thin, well-groomed, black mustache. He would board, look for a young girl to sit next to and then, from behind the cover of a newspaper, place a hand in between her legs. Some of the girls bolted and some froze in fear, unable to move. The man in the bowler hat would either stay in his seat or get off at the next stop depending on the girl’s reaction. Simon had initially felt that it was a lot of energy and hours to spend to try to identify a groper, but the man in the bowler hat had become aggressive. Even more disconcerting, he had followed the last girl to her home.

  Simon stood and turned the computer off. There were only so many hours he could stare at a screen or search databases for images. He checked his watch and saw that it was close to five. He was supposed to meet Leanda at the train station at King’s Cross at six. If he left now, he might have time for a pint. He grabbed his raincoat and umbrella and strode toward the door. He stopped and turned back at Nigel who was still at his desk going through the database. “It’s Friday.”

  “Just a little while longer. I might have something here.”

  “Alright.” Simon donned his raincoat and opened the door just as it began to rain. “See you Monday.”

  Nigel held up a hand in response, never looking up from the monitor as he turned up the volume on Us and Them.

  Simon stepped out into rain that alternated between a heavy mist and light drops. He walked to the curb, his head deep under the umbrella and almost stepped out in front of a car. He still couldn’t get used to looking to the right before crossing the street. He stopped into The Skinners Arms, an old alehouse where the super-recognizers sometimes went after work. He folded the umbrella, stood it by the door, brushed water off his jacket and went to the bar.

  The bar had no stools which was fine with Simon since he’d been sitting all day. He ordered a pint of stout and surveyed the establishment. It had dark dado wood paneling and a small brass railing that separated the tables from the bar. Several old pensioners stood at one end of the bar counting the change the bartender had put in front of them. Most of the tables were filled with people who looked as if they had left work early or were getting out of the rain.

  There was a light hum of conversation and the distinctive aroma of fried food. He sipped from his beer and thought he must be in love because it sure wasn’t the food or the weather that was an attraction in this country. And though his unit was elite it was still a policeman’s salary. He could be in Vegas now, enjoying warm weather and good food and making a lot more money. He checked his watch and though he wasn’t finished with the first stout he ordered another. The trade-off for not having to tip in this country was ba
d service.

  He sipped on the second stout and watched people scurry about in the rain through the window that ran the length of the room on one side of the bar. He raised his beer, then quickly lowered it as a man with a mustache wearing a brown bowler hat strode by the window.

  Simon stuck a hand in his pocket, retrieving his wallet. “Excuse me,” he called to the bartender. The bartender, whose attention was focused on a soccer game on TV, didn’t seem to hear him. He threw a ten pound note onto the bar and ran to the door.

  He glanced at the cluster of wet umbrellas leaning against the wall, decided against wading through them in search of his, and pulled his raincoat from the stob on the wall. He struggled into it and hurried in the direction the man had been walking. Small drops of wind-blown rain stung his face as he searched for the man on the crowded sidewalks. The King’s Cross station was directly ahead, so he thought that the man might be headed for one of the double decker buses that stopped there every ten minutes.

  Simon stopped on the corner, wiped rain from his brow and scanned the crowd. A sea of umbrellas, swaying with the strides of the hurrying walkers obscured his vision. His phone rang, but he ignored it and he searched the crowded sidewalks for the brown bowler hat. He blew out air in frustration and stepped into a corner bakery and out of the rain. He ignored the look of the woman behind the counter, wiped water from his eyes and called Leanda.

  “Hey, I tried to call you.”

  “Yeah, I saw. I was busy. Where are you?”

  “My cab is just pulling up in front of the station.”

  “Okay, I’m across the street.” Simon peered through the window of the bakery at the front of King’s Cross Station. It was one of the largest rail stations in London and one of the country’s busiest transportation hubs. Over a hundred and fifty years old but newly renovated, it was like the neighborhood that surrounded it- - once rundown and now attempting to become upscale with new hotels and assorted modern shops that were replacing a seedy, grimy, long neglected area. The Diagrid roof of the station spanned over a hundred yards without one visible bolt in the entire structure, creating an open, uninterrupted space that crossed the length of a semi-circular vaulted concourse. The structure stood as a giant bridge protruding over the sea of hustle and bustle that lay at its feet. Circular windows on the brick facade served as giant eyes looking out over the black, iconic cabs and red double-decker buses that slipped efficiently through the narrow rivulets of egress, dispensing and receiving their customers seamlessly. The station was essentially a symbol of the synthesis between old and new London.