by Bill Bernico
Norman grabbed the electric sander and pressed the trigger. The belt rotated and Norman pressed it to the last Popsicle stick. A few seconds later, all four sticks broke loose from Gunther’s chin and fell to the floor.
“Damn,” Norman said. “Looks like I’ll have to redo that last part.”
Christopher Gunther violently shook in the chair, trying to free himself from his confines. It was no use. He opened his mouth wide, trying to breathe. A few seconds later Gunther passed out. Norman held the small bottle under the open nostril until Gunther came around again.
“Tell you what, Christopher,” Norman said. “I think we can just leave it like it is. A little calk will cover that up and to tell you the truth, I don’t think people will notice.” Norman squeezed another bead of calk against Gunther’s chin and rubbed it smooth with his gloved finger. Gunther squirmed and moaned.
Norman stood back, framed his hands like a movie director over Gunther’s face and said, “Yes, I think that will do nicely. That takes care of the imperfections, now all we need to work on is the reimbursement part of this transaction. Oh, that’s right, you don’t have any money, do you? Well, I guess I’ll just have to think of a few more ways to even out this injustice.”
“No,” Gunther yelled. “I have money. I can pay you. Please.”
Norman feigned surprise. “You have money?” he said. “How can that be? You went bankrupt. Now where’s a guy like you gonna come up with twenty-five hundred dollars on such short notice?”
“My pocket,” Gunther said. “I hid it from the court. Take it. It’s yours, just let me out of here.”
Norman was surprised that he hadn’t bothered to check Gunther’s pockets before he secured him to the chair. He reached into the man’s front pants pocket and felt a roll of paper. He grabbed it and pulled it from the man’s pocket. It was a roll big enough to choke a horse. Norman whistled. “Oh wow, Christopher,” he said. “If you’d only let me know about this earlier. Are you telling me I went through all this remodeling on you for nothing?”
“Cut me loose,” Gunther said. “Just take the money and leave me alone.”
“Oh no,” Norman said. “I couldn’t do that. I’m going to have to put you back to the way you were before the remodeling job I did on you. Don’t worry, I’ll be done in a few minutes and you’ll never even know I was here by the time I finish the job. First, I have to get that awful calk out of your other nostril.” Norman squeezed the trigger on his electric drill and inched toward Gunther.
*****
Lieutenant Anderson had been called to the scene of yet another body that had been found floating in the reservoir. It was the body of a middle-aged man whose arms and chest looked like it had been scraped with a cheese grater. The man’s throat yawned open like an exotic bird’s beak. Another inch and the head would have been totally severed from the body. It was lying on the stretcher, its eyes fixed open and staring upward.
“Think there’s any connection to the girl we found last week in the dump?” Andy Reynolds said as he examined this body.
“Hard to say,” Anderson answered. “She had hot metal poured on her. This guy’s had his skin scraped off. I don’t see how they relate.”
“Looks like both killers had some twisted kind of game going on,” Andy said. “I mean, normal people don’t do these kinds of things to other people, do they?”
“Define normal,” Anderson said.
On his way back to headquarters, Lieutenant Anderson stopped by the office of his friend, a private detective by the name of Elliott Cooper. Elliott was the third generation P.I. to operate out of this office, after his father, Clay and his grandfather, Matt. Elliott’s wife, Gloria was the newest addition to the business, having joined several years earlier. Their office was on the third floor in a building on Hollywood Boulevard.
Anderson knocked on Elliott’s office door purely as a formality, but didn’t wait for an answer before he let himself in. “Elliott,” he said, walking past Gloria’s empty desk. “What’s happening in your world today?”
“Gloria’s out on a case and I’m manning the phone,” Elliott said. “What brings you around?”
“I’m just on my way back to the office,” Eric said. “Found another body wrapped in plastic at the dump. That makes two in two weeks.”
“Sounds like more than a coincidence,” Elliott said. “Got any leads?”
“Nothing concrete,” Eric said.
“How about paper mache?” Elliott said.
“Huh?”
Elliott waved him off. “Never mind,” he said. “Bad joke.”
Eric rolled his eyes. “Okay then,” he said.
“Any reason in particular that you’re telling me all this?” Elliott said. “Could it be you need my help?”
“Well, now that you brought it up,” Eric said, “there is one way you could make yourself useful.”
“And what’s that?” Elliott said.
“We’ve got three men on vacation this week,” Eric said. “And the captain’s already given me the okay to farm out some of our leg work. It probably doesn’t pay like your regular clients would, but you know how county budgets are? At least it’ll get you out of here and back on the street. You interested?”
“What kind of budget are you working with?” Elliott said.
“Eighty bucks a day and expenses,” Eric said.
“That’s less than half our regular fee,” Elliott said. “You going to throw in lunch?”
Eric shrugged. “Depends on your appetite,” he said. “This would be coming out of my pocket and I don’t have a rich dead uncle to leave me his estate. So, are you in or out?”
Elliott thought for a moment, leafed through his desk calendar and looked up at Eric. “In,” he said. “When did you need me to start?”
“Are you still sittin’ there,” Eric said.
“That soon, eh?” Elliott said, rising from his desk and pulling his cell phone from his pocket. He dialed Gloria and left her a message telling her where she could reach him for the rest of the day and then followed Lieutenant Eric Anderson out of the office. When the two of them got to the parking lot, Elliott turned to Anderson and said, “Where do you want me to start?”
“Ever heard of a handyman named Christopher Gunter?” Eric said.
Elliott shook his head, “Name doesn’t ring any bells. Should it?”
“His contractor’s truck was found almost obscured by bushes in a ditch on the outskirts of town,” Eric said. “They had it towed out of there and found a lot of sugar in the gas tank. Our first victim’s car had sugar in the gas tank. We found the owner in the dump, wrapped in plastic and filled with burns and hardened lead in several orifices. We’re going under the assumption that they are connected, if for no other reason than their vehicles. I’d like you to try and get a lead on Gunther. Check with his friends, family and co-workers and see if anyone has any ideas as to his whereabouts. Let me know what you find out.”
“Do you know where he works out of?” Elliott said.
“He used to have an office and garage on Sepulveda before he declared bankruptcy,” Eric said. “Last anyone knew, he was working out of his house.” Eric gave him a slip of paper with the address on it and returned to his cruiser.
Elliott pocketed the paper and drove south on Cahuenga to the house on Romaine Street. It was a white ranch set back from the street by a large front yard of mostly brown grass. The house looked as though it had fallen on neglect by its owner. There were three newspapers lying on the front stoop and the mailbox had several letters peeking out of the flap that covered the box. It was obvious that no one had been home for several days, but Elliott knocked anyway. He wasn’t surprised when no one came to the door.
Elliott looked both ways up and down the street before stepping up onto the stoop and plucking the mail from the box. He looked at the return addresses, trying to determine if any of them could be a lead as to Christopher Gunther’s whereabouts. One letter was from a finance co
mpany on Santa Monica. Another was from Publisher’s Clearing House. The other letters’ return addresses only told Elliott that Gunther owed more than he was earning. He stuffed the letters back into the box and walked back to his car.
When Elliott got back into his car, his cell phone began to chime. He flipped it open and held it to his ear. “Cooper here,” he said in his most professional voice, even though he could tell by the caller I.D. that it was Gloria calling.
“Elliott,” Gloria said. “I got your message earlier. Where are you?”
“I down on Romaine Street trying to locate a man for Lieutenant Anderson,” Elliott said. “What about you? How’d your case turn out?”
“The kid wasn’t missing,” Gloria said. “He’d crawled under the front porch, trying to hide from his angry father. The kid fell asleep under there. He came out on his own when he got hungry. Easiest two hundred bucks I’ve ever earned.”
“Then you’d be free to help me?” Elliott said.
“How soon did you need me?” Gloria said. “I was going to stop at home and look in on Mrs. Chandler and Matt for a minute.”
“Go ahead,” Elliott said. “Just call me when you’re done. I have a few places that need to be checked and we could finish in half the time if you help me with it.”
“I’ll call you after I’ve stopped home,” Gloria said. “Figure thirty-five or forty minutes, tops.” The both closed their phones and went their own ways.
Elliott drove to Gunther’s former office and garage simply because he wanted to get a feel for the man he was looking for. There was a space above the garage door where it looked like an eight-foot sign had been removed. The garage door was closed, but not locked. Elliott stepped inside to have a look around. It had been cleaned out except for a small pile of scrap two-by-fours and a broom. Elliott left the garage and tried the door to the office. That was locked so he stepped up to the front window, shielded his eyes with his cupped hands and peered in through the glass.
An old desk still sat against the far wall, most of its drawers pulled out. There was a calendar hanging from the wall in front of the desk and to the right Elliott could see a small pedestal sink. This could very well have been Elliott’s office in another life. He stepped away from the window and returned to his car. He wasn’t sure where he’d look next so he called Lieutenant Anderson at the twelfth precinct. Eric picked up on the second ring.
“Anderson,” Eric said.
“Eric,” Elliott said. “It’s Elliott Cooper. I just came from Gunther’s house and then checked out his old office and garage. I’ve got zip. I’m going to stop over at the courthouse and check the bankruptcy records. I’ll let you know what I find.”
Elliott folded his phone and dropped it in his pocket. The courthouse was a fifteen minute drive and Elliott filled the time humming some of his favorite oldies from the sixties. By the time he’d finished mentally singing three of The Turtles’ top ten hits, he was sitting in front of the courthouse. Elliott left his car at the curb, dropped a quarter in the meter and walked inside.
He found a guy, maybe ten years younger than himself working the counter. Elliott introduced himself and asked to see the public record of Gunther’s bankruptcy hearing. The young man excused himself and returned in a few minutes with a printout of the proceedings and a list of the people and businesses that Gunther had left holding the bag for money he owed them.
The list included two lumber yards, a tool supply house, several smaller businesses where he had apparently done some handy work and a list of six individuals who had tried to sue Gunther for shoddy workmanship. None of the people of businesses on the list got a dime once the paper had been filed. Elliott ruled out the lumber yards, tool supply house and the smaller businesses, since they could all write off the loss on their taxes. That left six individuals who had been left holding the bag and who probably also had extensive attorney and court costs that they’d never get to recover.
“Can you make me a photocopy of that last list of names?” Elliott asked the young man behind the counter.
“All copies are three dollars,” the man said. “I know, it seems high, but that’s the amount the county set. I guess it’s to keep people from asking for a hundred copies of something just for the hell of it.”
Elliott handed over the three dollars and got a list of six people, along with their addresses, phone numbers and amounts each was suing Christopher Gunther for. “Thanks,” Elliott said, folding the printout twice and slipping it in his pocket.
He had just made it back to his car when he noticed a meter maid slipping a ticket under the windshield wiped of the car behind him. Elliott Slid behind the wheel and was gone before the meter maid could write another ticket. At the first red light, Elliott glanced at the printout and selected the name whose address was closest to where he was now. He turned left at the light and headed south towards Wilshire Boulevard. He followed Wilshire to Normandie and took a left at Maplewood Avenue. The address he was looking for turned out to be situated above a one-car garage with a set of stairs alongside it.
Elliott parked across the street, climbed the stairs and knocked on the door. A woman in a flowered house dress answered the door.
“Yes?” she said, looking at Elliott with some suspicion.
“Mabel Francis?” Elliott said, glancing at the photocopied list in his hand.
The woman nodded but said nothing.
Elliott pulled the leather case containing his badge and I.D. out and held it up for the woman to inspect. “My name is Elliott Cooper,” he said “and I’m looking into Christopher’s Gunther’s bankruptcy case. I wonder if I could speak with you for a moment.”
“What do you want to know?” she said, still not opening the door for Elliott.
“Mrs. Francis,” Elliott said, “I noticed that you had filed a lawsuit against Mr. Gunther in the amount of eight hundred seventy dollars.”
“That’s Miss Francis,” Mabel said, “and yes, I did sue that no good son-of-a-bitch. I hired him to put in just three small cabinets in my kitchen. He screwed that up so bad that I had to have another contractor come in and tear them out again and put in different cabinets.”
“And he wouldn’t stand behind his work?” Elliott said.
Mabel shook her head. “He offered me a settlement of two hundred dollars and I was asking for the full eight hundred. When I finally agreed to settle for four hundred fifty dollars, I figured it was better than nothing and that I could finally but that bastard behind me once and for all. Then three weeks ago I get a notice from my lawyer that the idiot filed for bankruptcy and that I’d be getting nothing. So now I’m not only out the eight hundred dollars I paid him, but I’m also out three hundred seventy-five dollars that I paid my lawyer.”
“Do you have any idea where I might find Mr. Gunther?” Elliott said.
“Hopefully in a some ditch, bleeding,” Mabel said and closed the door.
Elliott crossed Mabel Francis off his list. Sure, she was mad as a wet hen, but he didn’t see her as someone who’d try and exact revenge on her own. He checked the next closest name on the list and drove to the address listed.
After talking to the next three people on the list, Elliott determined that none of them had what it took to try and get revenge for a botched job and an unpaid settlement. One of the names on the list belonged to an elderly couple, one was a young school teacher and the other had actually gotten a settlement right before the bankruptcy papers had been filed. That left just two more names to check.
Elliott moved on to the fifth name on the list, a man named Norman Hyde, who lived in Hollywood just south of the freeway on Fountain Avenue. The house was nestled between a four-apartment complex and a duplex, separated by a double garage. The house looked like one of those cottage-type places that were popular during the post war years. There was a small white pickup truck parked in the driveway.
Elliott walked across the street and up onto the porch. He rang the doorbell and waited.
&
nbsp; *****
Norman squeezed the trigger on his electric drill and inched toward Gunther. Gunther tried to scream, but his throat closed up on him. As Norman moved the spinning drill bit into position beneath Gunther’s nostril, the doorbell chimed upstairs. Norman stopped the drill, laid it on the bench and quickly wrapped a blue bandana around Gunther’s mouth.
“Don’t go away, Mr. Gunther,” Norman said. “I’ll be right back.”
Norman climbed the stairs as the second doorbell chime sounded. He smoother his hair back and then grabbed the doorknob, twisting it and pulling the door open. “Yes?” he said. “Whatever you’re selling, I don’t want any.” He started to close the door and then stopped when the intruder called out his name.
“Mr. Hyde?” Elliott said.
“Yeah, so what?” Norman said.
Elliott held his badge and I.D. in front of him and introduced himself. “Mr. Hyde,” Elliott said, “I’m looking into the people who had filed lawsuits against Christopher Gunther, the contractor and handyman.”
“Handy?” Norman said. “The only thing handy about that asshole was the way he made sure to collect for the entire job up front. If you’re looking into him, you also know that he went bankrupt before I could collect my settlement. So, did you come here just to aggravate me by reminding me of what I’m not going to collect?”
“Actually,” Elliott said, “I’m looking into his disappearance and I was wondering if you knew where he might be.”
“How the hell would I know that?” Norman said. “After the hearing, he disappeared like a fart in the wind and left me holding the bag for twenty-eight hundred dollars.”
Elliott took a close look at the irate man now, and wondered why he hadn’t notice this before. The man standing just inside the door had one small speck of blood alongside his nose, just below his left eye. Elliott couldn’t see any cut or scrape where the blood might have come from and an alarm went off in his head. He quickly looked down, pretending to study his list.
