by Bill Bernico
“I’m sorry,” Gloria said. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I didn’t see you there.”
“You startled me,” the woman said. “I wasn’t expecting anyone. Did you want something?”
I checked my list and said, “Is Doctor Henning at home?”
The woman looked at me and then at Gloria. She turned back to me and shook her head. “Chester died two years ago,” she said. “Why did you want to see him?”
“We were just checking a short list of doctors who were in the phonebook three years ago and who weren’t in the new edition,” Gloria explained.
“Well, that’s why he’s not listed in this year’s book,” the woman said. “Is there anything I can help you with?”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Thanks for your time. Sorry to have bothered you.”
Gloria and I turned and walked back down the driveway and got into the car. I crossed Chester Henning off our list and looked at Gloria. “I’d say the next closest one would be a Doctor Chalmers in Burbank,” I told her. “I guess we could just pick up the Hollywood Free to the Ventura and…”
“I know,” Gloria said defensively. “I’m from here, remember?”
“Pardon me,” I said. “You’re on your own.”
Gloria wound around down the mountain again and found the onramp heading north. She turned east on the Ventura and got off at Riverside Drive. North of the freeway lay a small, par three golf course. The house we were looking for overlooked the course from Walnut Street. Gloria parked on the road and the two of us walked up an inclined driveway, flanked by a three foot retaining wall covered with stucco. We stepped up to the front door and rang the bell. A moment later a middle-aged couple came to the door.
The man looked us over and decided we were harmless. “Can I help you?” he said.
I handed the man one of my business cards and said, “We’re looking for Stuart Chalmers. Might you be him?”
The man shook his head. “I’m afraid you have the wrong address,” he said.
I looked at my piece of paper and then back up at the man. “This is 1467 East Walnut, isn’t it?” I said.
The woman standing next to him tapped him on the shoulder. “Honey,” she said. “I think the man they’re looking for was the previous owner of this house. You remember Doctor Chalmers?”
The man nodded and then turned to me. “Doctor Chalmers used to live here,” he said. “But he obviously doesn’t anymore.”
“Any idea where I might find him?” I said.
The woman turned to her husband and said, “I don’t remember what happened to Mrs. Chalmers, but the doctor had a stroke a couple of years back and he had to go into a nursing home. That’s why they were selling this place. Poor man, now he just sits there all day staring out the window.”
I crossed Chalmers off my list and said, “Thank you,” and turned to leave. Gloria followed me back to the car.
“Strike two,” she said as we got back into the car. “Now where?”
“Get back on the Hollywood Freeway,” I said. “We have to get down to Melrose Avenue just east of Highland. I’m sure you know the way.”
Gloria turned her head and winked at me. “I could have been a cab driver,” she said, “if I hadn’t run into you first.”
“You mean I stood between you and a promising career as a cabbie?” I said. “Sorry.”
Half an hour later Gloria turned west on Melrose and then north again just before we reached Highland Avenue. This neighborhood didn’t look like the kind of place any respectable doctor would live, but that’s the address that was listed in the phone book three years ago. Gloria pulled up to the curb and killed the engine.
“How’d you like to stay with the car while I check this out?” I said. “I don’t feel good about leaving the car unattended.”
“That’s a good idea,” Gloria said, “but how about you stay with the car and I’ll check out the house? I might be able to get a little more out of some old guy than you could. Okay?” Gloria left the keys dangling from the ignition and exited to the street. She had taken only a few steps when she turned back and leaned down at the driver’s window. “What was this guy’s name?” she said.
I checked the slip and said, “Fischer. Albert Fisher.”
“Got it,” Gloria said. She crossed mid-block and walked up to the front door of a pink stucco ranch with a red tile roof and a wrought iron fence around its perimeter. She rang the doorbell and waited.
The door opened a moment later and a guy in his late fifties or early sixties answered stared out at her. “I already have one,” he said.
“One what?” Gloria said.
“One of whatever it is you’re selling,” the man said.
“I’m not selling anything,” Gloria explained. “Are you Doctor Fisher?”
The man stopped closing the door and took a closer look at the stranger on his stoop. “No one’s called me doctor for several years. How do you know me?”
Gloria handed him one of her cards. “We’re looking into a murder from three and a half years ago,” she said. “Our research turned up your name and I was wondering if I could just talk to you for a few minutes?”
“A murder?” Fisher said. “I don’t know anything about any murder. Who got murdered?”
“It might be better if we talked inside,” Gloria said. “Wouldn’t want the neighbors sticking their noses into this, would you?”
“No, of course not,” Fisher said. “Please come in.” He gestured toward the living room. Won’t you have a seat?”
Gloria studied her surroundings on the way into the living room. Fisher saw something in her eyes.
“I know,” he said. “Not what you’d expect from a doctor, is it?”
Gloria waved him off. “Oh, no, I wasn’t…”
“Young lady,” Fisher said, “take my advice and don’t get involved with gambling. This is how you could end up. I got in too deep and lost nearly everything I had. This place is just a rental. They took my house when I couldn’t pay. My wife left me and I’m just scraping by on my retirement fund. And that won’t last long at this rate. The clinic where I worked requested that I leave and they gave me the option of taking early retirement. I took it, rather than risk negative publicity because of my addiction.”
“Sorry to hear that, Doctor Fisher,” she said. Gloria sat on the edge of a tan sofa and pulled out a notepad and pen. “Doctor Fisher, the man who was killed three and a half years ago was my father.”
Fisher sat down in a wing-back chair and leaned in toward Gloria. “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. But how can I help?”
Before he died,” Gloria explained, “Dad was able to get off one shot of his own. He hit the man in the upper thigh. My partners and I are just doing routine checks with some of the area doctors to see if they remember treating anyone with a gunshot wound to the thigh. This guy took a bullet to the upper thigh, near the groin.”
“I’d have had to report a wound like that,” Fisher said. “I may have been a gambler but I never broke any rules when it came to my practice. If left untreated, a wound like that would prove fatal in a matter of minutes. He’d bleed to death unless he got immediate help.”
“So you didn’t personally treat anyone like the man I described,” Gloria said. “Would you know of anyone who might not have as high a standard and who might have treated him on the quiet?”
Fisher shook his head. “None of my colleagues would treat a wound like that without reporting it,” he said. “Do you know for sure that this man is even still alive?”
“No I don’t,” Gloria said. “But no unidentified bodies turned up during that period or I’d have heard about it.”
“I’m sorry,” Fisher said. “I don’t think I can help you.”
“Well, thank you for your time, Doctor Fisher,” Gloria said. “You take care now.” She got up and turned toward the door.
Fisher walked with her and opened the door for her. “I hope you find your father’s killer,”
he said, and closed the door.
Gloria hurried back to the car to find me sitting behind the wheel. I gestured toward the passenger seat and she got it. She told me what she’d learned on our way back to the office.
“I wonder how Clay and Dean made out,” Gloria said.
“I don’t know,” I said, “but if their luck is anything like ours, I’m afraid we’re stalled at step one.”
“Maybe not,” Gloria said. “Let me call Clay first and see if they dug up anything we can use,” Gloria dialed Dad’s cell and waited. “Clay,” she said. “How are you and Dean coming along on your end?”
“We got almost nothing from the bartender,” Clay said.
“Almost?” Gloria said. “What does that mean?”
“It means he didn’t know the shooter,” Clay said, “but we did get one piece of information I think could turn out to be useful. The shooter was hit in the thigh, as you remember. Well, the blood trail stopped when it got to the curb, so chances are he had a driver waiting for him outside. And with him bleeding that badly, he must have left a mess in someone’s car.”
“Are you suggesting we check the car washes and detailing shops?” Gloria said. “Maybe someone has a record of cleaning a car with blood on the front seat and floor. This guy would have left quite a mess.”
“Exactly,” Clay said. “Dean and I will start from the neighborhood nearest the bar and work our way outward. Why don’t you and Elliott start at, say, Melrose and Highland and work your way inward toward the bar? We’ll keep in touch by phone if any of us finds anything. Sound like a plan?”
“We’re on it,” Gloria said and closed the phone.
Gloria handed me my phone and I set it on the console between us. “What did they find?” I said.
Gloria told me about the blood trail and the possible bloody mess in someone’s car. I listened as I drove to Highland and Melrose. I stopped at the corner near a drug store and told Gloria I’d be right out. Inside, I asked a clerk if I could look at their phone book and jotted down the names and addresses of six car washes in the area they we were to cover. I thanked the clerk and hurried back out to the car with my list.
“If Dad and Dean are covering their area as quickly as we can,” I said, “we should overlap somewhere around Fountain and Vine. Let’s get started.”
The first three places we visited told us that they weren’t equipped to do detailing jobs like the one I described. They only washed the exteriors and vacuumed the insides. One of them did recommend an auto detailer on Santa Monica Boulevard near Cahuenga. It was nearly three-thirty when we made it there. My stomach was grumbling to remind me that I’d skipped lunch.
Gloria and I walked into the detailing shop and asked to see the manager. We were asked to wait in the lounge and a minute later a man in overalls stepped up to where we sat.
“Don’t tell me,” he said. “Your antenna broke off in the wash. Well, our sign clearly states that we’re not responsible for…”
“I held up one hand and stopped him. “We’re not here with any complaint,” I assured him. “My name is Elliott Cooper and this is Gloria.” I handed him a business card.
He looked the card over and then looked at me. His hard face softened. “Sorry,” he said, “but I get too many people trying to get me to pay for something on their cars that they broke themselves.” He stuck out his hand. “Marvin Sanders,” he said. “I own the place. How can I help you?”
“We’re looking into an incident from several years ago that involved a cleanup and detailing job,” I said. “The car we’re talking about would have had a lot of blood on the seat and on the floor. I’m not sure if it was the front seat or the back seat since I don’t even know what kind of car it was or who owned it. I was hoping you might remember a cleanup like that.”
“And this was how long ago?” Sanders said.
“A little more than three years ago,” Gloria said. “Sometime after May twenty-first.”
“Three years ago,” Sanders said. “Do you know how many cars come through here in just a week, let alone three years?”
“I can imagine,” I said, “but how many come through here with a bloody mess in them?”
Sanders snapped his fingers. “Now that you mention it,” he said, “we did have one like that. I remember because I thought it was unusual at the time. Some guy came in here telling me that he’s accidentally hit a dog in traffic and that he’d put the dog on the back seat and had taken it to the vet. He asked if we could clean up blood from his upholstery and carpet.”
Gloria’s face lit up. “Do you keep records from that long ago?” she said.
“I have to keep them for seven years,” Sanders explained. “You know, for tax purposes.”
“Do you think we could have a look at those records?” Gloria said, a puppy dog look playing on her face.
“I don’t see why not,” Sanders said. “It’s not like there’s any client/detailer confidentiality laws in play here, now is there?”
“Thank you so much, Mr. Sanders,” Gloria said. “Would you have a room where we could look through the record boxes?”
“I can do you one better,” Sanders said. “Everything on those invoices has been entered into our computer system. I can set you up in my office and open that database for you. Do you know your way around a database?”
“I should,” Gloria said. “We have one for our business records, too. Just lead me to it.”
Sanders took us both to his office and started his database program. We both looked away as he entered his password and opened the files we needed. He got up from his chair and stood aside while Gloria sat down in front of the screen.
“I have to get back to work,” Sanders said. “If you need anything else, I’ll be in the garage.”
“Thanks you so much, Mr. Sanders,” Gloria said.
Sanders left the room and Gloria jumped right in with the sorting routine on the screen. The screen showed a total of more than four hundred thousand records. She first sorted the list by date and isolated everything after May twenty-first. That narrowed the search down to a possible seventy-one thousand records.
“With this many records, this could take us the rest of our lives,” I said.
“Hold on, Elliott,” Gloria said. She clicked the search icon and selected the comments field, entering ‘blood’ in the search criteria. She got eleven hits and they all fell into line as neatly as a row of West Point cadets. “Eleven,” she said. “I think we can manage that in now time. And we can even narrow that down by date. Whoever had it cleaned wouldn’t have waited more than a week or two to have it done, otherwise it would have been permanent. So, let’s just check the date column and see what jumps out at us.
There were just three that fit the time frame. The one that interested us was dated May twenty-fourth, three years ago. Gloria opened the single file and read the comments section. It said:
Customer stated he hit a dog and carried it in his car to the vet. Extra charge for cleaning blood from upholstery and carpet. Most blood came out. Small stain on front seat back was too set in to remove. Customer signed off on detail.
We checked the customer name field and saw that the car’s owner was a man named William Claude Dunkenfield with an address in Hollywood. I jotted that name down on my notepad, along with the car’s license number.
“This has to be our guy,” I said.
“Well,” Gloria said, “just in case he isn’t, I’m printing out this entire list to take along.”
“All seventy-one thousand?” I said.
Gloria was about to clarify her statement when she looked at me and saw the mischievous look on my face. “Yeah, right,” she said. “No, just these eleven.” She hit the print button and a single sheet of names rolled out of the printer. She folded it three times and stuck it in her pocket.
Gloria closed the database and we returned to the garage to find Sanders. We thanked him for his cooperation and told him we’d recommend his services to our frien
ds.
“Thanks,” Sanders said. “I can use the business. Glad I was able to help. I hope you find the guy you’re looking for.”
We got back into the car and I immediately dialed Dad’s phone. Dad answered right away.
“Elliott,” Dad said. “Having any luck?”
“A little,” I said. “How about you and Dean?”
“Nothing so far,” Dad said.
“Well, Gloria and I think we may have found the car and its owner,” I said.
“Really?” Dad said. “What did you find?”
I opened my notepad and said, “We just came from a car wash and detailing place on Santa Monica. The owner there let us go through his customer database and we found eleven records of blood cleanup over the past three and a half years.”
“That’s great, Elliott,” Dad said. “You want us to help you track down those eleven customers?”
“It gets better,” I told him. “We narrowed that down to just one guy who had the right kind of blood stains and who fell into the right time frame. I copied down the customer’s name and address. We’re going over to that address now.”
“What’s this guy’s name?” Dad said.
I looked down at my notes and said, “Dunkenfield. William Claude Dunkenfield, over on Las Palmas.”
The phone went silent for a moment and then I could hear Dad laughing.
“What’s so funny?” I said.
“You won’t find him,” Dad said. “And chances are the address won’t exist, either.”
“How would you know that?” I said.
“Did you forget who you’re talking to?” Dad said. “I am the movie and TV trivia king. Do you have any idea who William Claude Dunkenfield is, or was?”
“Huh?” I said, totally baffled now.
“That was the real name of W.C. Fields, my little chickadee,” Dad said. “He never gave one an even break, either.”
