The Goldfish Bowl

by Laurence Gough

  *

  Inspector Homer Bradley stood at his window with his hands in his pockets, staring morosely down through the slanting rain at the adjoining construction site. The foundation of the new building had been laid a week ago, and now men in black rain slickers were removing the plywood forms and exposing the raw, green-tinged cement beneath. Soon the framework of steel I-beams would come spouting up towards him, plunging his office into eternal shadow, stripping him of his view. He lifted his eyes, and looked out across the dark and gloomy harbour.

  A Russian freighter pushed against the wind and outgoing tide towards the grainery next to the Second Narrows bridge, the bow wave out of all proportion to the vessel’s slow progress through the water. High above the ship a dozen or more herring gulls flew on a direct line towards the rocky, protein-rich shores of Third Beach. As Bradley watched, the hindmost gull suddenly peeled away from the formation, spiralling swiftly down until it was lost among the confusion of the waves.

  Bradley went over to his desk, sat down, helped himself to a cigar from his carved cedar box.

  The telephone rang. The ringing seemed unnaturally loud, as if the instrument was somehow trying to transmit the urgency of the caller. Bradley struck a match on the underside of his desk, got the cigar going to his satisfaction, and picked up the receiver.

  The call was from a motorcycle cop named Layton. He had radioed in from his Harley and been patched in to Bradley’s office through the emergency switchboard. Bradley’s ear was filled with the hiss and gurgle of traffic, the erratic throbbing of the Harley’s 1200 c.c. engine. He blew smoke at the ceiling. Layton made a big deal of identifying himself. His voice was fragmented, muddy. No doubt it was the quality of the telephone connection but Bradley couldn’t help picturing Layton’s front teeth, the gaps filled with large, furry insects, the fauna of the open road. He had to ask Layton to repeat himself three times before he finally understood that a psychiatrist named Miriam Okahashi had been nearly decapitated by a single shot fired from a large-calibre rifle.

  When he hung up the telephone he was standing, and he happened to be facing the window. The rain was coming down much harder now, a torrent of fat drops that rushed vertically towards the earth. The Russian freighter had passed out of his line of vision. The punishing rain had emptied the sky of birds.

  *

  Miriam Okahashi’s posture as she lay face down on the beige carpet suggested that she was still trying to run from the bullet that had struck her down. Her right leg was bent sharply, as if in mid-stride, and her left arm was flung forward. Her glossy black hair was in disarray, and a few shards of glass sparkled in the pool of blood that surrounded her head like a dark and monstrous halo. Layton, pointing out the location of the bullet hole, actually put his finger in it. Bradley stared at him, and he blushed, and turned away. Bradley was staring out the window at the red brick building across the street when Parker, George Franklin, Farley Spears, Jerry Goldstein, Mel Dutton and several other homicide cops filed into the office. Bradley assumed they had all come up in the same crowded elevator. He crooked his finger at Parker and Franklin, stepped over the body and pushed his way through to the door. The three of them took the elevator back down to the lobby and Bradley led them out of the building and into the rain.

  The street was crowded with police vehicles that had monitored Layton’s call and scooted towards the crime scene on the off-chance of picking up a piece of the action. Civilian traffic was backing up fast. Bradley, followed by Parker and Franklin, threaded his way through six lanes of stalled traffic and across the sidewalk to the glass front doors of the red brick building. The left-side door was slightly ajar and Bradley saw that it was being held open by a spent .460 Magnum cartridge. The cartridge dropped tinkling to the floor when he yanked open the door.

  Franklin stooped and tried to insert the point of his pen into the shell to pick it up. But the mouth of the casing had been flattened into an oval by the pressure of the door, and the pen would not fit into it. Bradley saw that Franklin had a problem. There was a bent nail on the floor. He kicked it over. Franklin used the nail to pick up the casing. He dropped the casing into a small glassine evidence bag and put the bag in his pocket.

  The sniper’s high-heeled shoes had left a clear trail, both coming and going, on the dusty concrete floor. They followed the footsteps through the debris of construction, up the three flights of stairs and through the access hatch to the roof. Just to the left of the doorway stood an open bottle of Beefeater gin, two miniature Schweppes tonic bottles and a tall glass on a soggy cardboard container.

  “Get Goldstein up here on the double,” Bradley said to Parker.

  Parker turned and went back down the stairs as fast as she could go.

  Franklin lit a cigarette. Down on the street a horn blared and someone shouted an oath. Franklin blew out his match, rubbed it between his thumb and index finger, dropped it into the cuff of his pants. Behind him, Willows stepped out on the roof, gravel crunching under his heels, his collar turned up against the rain.

  “Where the hell have you been?” said Bradley.

  “Excavating,” said Willows. He handed Bradley the battered 500 grain copper-jacketed bullet that had ripped through Miriam Okahashi’s throat.

  “Where’d you find it?”

  “Buried in a 1913 German-language edition of Jung’s Critique of Psychoanalysis.”

  “Of course,” said Bradley. “When you think about it, where else could it be.”

  Franklin flicked cigarette ash into his pocket.

  Willows looked around the roof, saw the Beefeater and Schweppes bottles, the empty glass drinking up the rain.

  “What’s it look like to you?” said Bradley.

  “As if he sat in the doorway out of the rain and had himself a couple of drinks while he waited for a clear shot.”

  “The dirty bastard,” said Bradley, nodding his agreement. He turned as Parker, Goldstein and Mel Dutton stepped out on to the roof. Goldstein waved his arm and a black umbrella appeared as if by magic above his curly blond head. He offered the umbrella to Parker but she refused to accept it. Bradley kicked at the roof, and sent a dozen small round pebbles skittering over the edge. “Why,” he said to no one in particular, “would a woman like Miriam Okahashi join a fucking singles club?”

  “She was working on her thesis,” said Willows. “It was part of her research.”

  Bradley stared malevolently at him, rain dripping steadily from his nose. “How did you find that out?”

  “Norbert told me.”

  “Who in hell is Norbert?”

  “Norbert Waterman. He plays tackle for the Lions. He’s also Miriam Okahashi’s boyfriend. They had an early dinner date and he dropped by hoping to catch her before she left for home. Found her dead on the floor and ran out into the street, right into Brooks Layton.”

  “Who?”

  “The motorcycle cop.”

  “Right,” said Bradley.

  “Scared the shit out of Layton, the way I heard it,” said Jerry Goldstein. He grinned at Willows, but Willows’ mind was occupied with George Franklin, who was standing motionless in the rain like a prop waiting to be used. A wet cigarette dangled from Franklin’s mouth. His skin was slack, and his face had an unhealthy greyish tinge. His dark eyes, sunken and haggard, stared unseeingly into the middle distance, the haze of rain. His movements, when he flicked the dead cigarette in a high arc that carried it down into the street, were strangely mechanical, almost lifeless. The shooting in the Palinkas apartment, Willows thought, had resulted in one instant murder and a second that was ongoing. He wondered what would happen when they eventually caught the sniper. Would his capture or death prove to be George Franklin’s salvation?

  Behind Willows, Mel Dutton crouched and took a half-step backwards as he focused on the two Schweppes bottles and the empty glass. Something slippery and soft gave beneath the heel of his shoe. He looked down and saw that he had stepped on a slice of lime.

  XIX


  WILLOWS WAVED HIS arm and made an exaggerated pouring motion. Freddy got a glass from the rack, dropped in a couple of ice cubes and added an ounce and a half of Cutty. He was pouring Willows’ third drink in less than an hour, and he wasn’t very happy about it, because in his considerable experience customers who drank too much were just as big a pain in the ass as customers who didn’t drink at all. He picked up the glass of Scotch and carried it over to Willows, put it down on the table in front of him.

  Willows didn’t look up. Freddy smiled down at him and said, “Take it easy, Jack. All this running back and forth is putting a real strain on my pacemaker.”

  “Where’s Sally,” said Willows, “doesn’t she usually work Monday nights?”

  “Sally’s in bed. You know who with?”

  Willows sipped at his drink. Finally, he looked up.

  “The ’flu,” said Freddy.

  “Next time,” said Willows, “bring me a double and save yourself a trip.”

  Freddy had to get the last word in. “You’re all something,” he said, “but it ain’t heart.”

  Three-quarters of an hour and two rounds later, Claire Parker hurried into the bar. Parker was wearing a burgundy parka, faded jeans, bright yellow gumboots. Her face was flushed with excitement, wet with rain. She gave Freddy his biggest smile of the week, and ordered a draft beer. Freddy nodded, and pointed at the booth where Willows was sitting.

  Parker’s coat left a smear of damp on the dark brown naugahyde as she slipped into the seat opposite Willows. He gave her a quizzical look.

  “Hi there,” said Parker. “Care to buy a lady a drink?”

  “I thought ladies bought their own drinks, if they drank at all.”

  “Better wind your watch. Jack. It’s running about twenty years late.”

  Willows helped himself to a mouthful of Scotch, put his glass back down on the formica hard enough to make the ice jump.

  “Are you drunk?” said Parker.

  “Not yet, but I’m working on it.”

  “That’s the main thing, not to stop working.”

  “Yeah, right.” Willows was very much aware of the delicate odour of Parker’s perfume, the faint smile hovering in the corners of her mouth. He regarded her carefully, wondering what the hell she was up to.

  Freddy arrived with Parker’s beer, and Parker said, “Where’s Sally?”

  “Sick,” said Freddy shortly. He’d guessed that Willows in his sour mood had already told Parker about his little joke and that she expected him to try it out on her, that it was a setup.

  “What’s wrong with her?” said Parker.

  “Stomach ’flu. She had me up all night, running back and forth with ginger ale, blankets, hot-water bottles.”

  “Words of wisdom,” said Willows.

  Freddy forced a smile.

  “I hope she gets better soon,” said Parker.

  “Thanks,” said Freddy. He gave the table a quick wipe, and drifted back to the bar.

  Parker waited until he had gone and then lifted her glass and said, “Here’s looking at me, kid.”

  “What’d you do, guide a boy scout across the street?”

  “Even better,” said Parker. She’d stopped kidding around; she sounded almost as sober as she looked.

  “Tell me about it.”

  “I’d rather show you,” said Parker. “Drink up, and let’s hit the road.”

  *

  Twenty minutes later, Parker unlocked the door to Miriam Okahashi’s outer office, and reached inside to switch on the lights. The reception area had the same beige carpet as the inner office. It was full of light oak furniture, glossy magazines, and the kind of plants that thrived on fluorescent light. Muzak seeped from speakers concealed in the acoustical tile ceiling. Parker used another key to get them into the psychiatrist’s office, and Willows’ curiosity finally got the better of him.

  “Where’d you get the keys?”

  “From Norbert. She always kept a spare set in his apartment.” Avoiding the blood and chalked outline on the carpet, Parker crossed to the bullet-punctured window and opened it wide. “Come here, take a look outside.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I want to show you something.”

  “What?”

  “Take a look, and find out.”

  Frowning, Willows went over to the window and peered outside. Down on the street, a pair of cyclists sped past, tyres whining on the wet asphalt, the bikes ticking along like overwound clocks. Willows looked up through the rain at the dark roof of the building across the street where, three days earlier, the sniper had crouched and fired.

  “Look to your left,” Parker instructed.

  Willows’ stomach muscles contracted involuntarily as he leaned out the window and into the path of the bullet that had struck Miriam Okahashi. At the far end of the block a rectangle of neon hung high above the sidewalk, the light staining the concrete red and green. Because of the rain and the distance, Willows couldn’t make out the words on the sign. He withdrew his head, shut and locked the window, and drew the curtain.

  “You see the sign?” said Parker.

  “What about it?”

  “It’s a deli. Remember the roast beef sandwich and the container of coleslaw left in the collection booth in the parking lot where Tate and the others were killed?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Well, that deli is where the killer bought his meal.”

  Willows went over to the black leather chesterfield and sat down. The sound of the Muzak in the outer office came faintly through the connecting door. He tried without success to block out an impossibly syrupy arrangement of a tune he recognized but couldn’t quite place. “Tell me more,” he said at last.

  Parker leaned against the desk with her hands in the pockets of the burgundy parka. “Farley Spears and I went over to the deli Friday afternoon, to buy a round of coffee for the forensics team. There was a sign inside pushing a roast beef sandwich and coleslaw combo for the lunch-hour crowd. The sign was what got me thinking. Then I noticed that the guy behind the counter had unusually small hands. And I remembered what George Franklin said at Atkinson’s funeral.”

  “That Goldstein thought the prints on the coleslaw container might have been made by a woman, or someone with small hands.”

  “Right,” said Parker. “The guy behind the counter turned out to be the owner. His name is Carl Heinzman. He and his wife, Gerta, run the place. They don’t have any employees, there’s just the two of them.”

  “You told them you were investigating a homicide, and asked them if they’d mind coming downtown.”

  “They were Austrian. Very cooperative.”

  “And you found out that Carl Heinzman’s prints matched the ones on the coleslaw container.”

  “Clever you,” said Parker. But she’d been the clever one, and they both knew it.

  “Did Heinzman remember the sale? Was he able to give you a description?”

  “No, but I didn’t expect him to. That wasn’t the point.”

  Willows gave her a blank look.

  “I checked the yellow pages,” said Parker. “There are more than a hundred delicatessens located within the city limits. What do you think the odds are that the killer just happened to pick one located in the same block as his next victim?”

  “What are you getting at?” said Willows.

  “I’m saying the food in the parking lot was left there on purpose. That the killer deliberately handed us a clue to the identity of his next victim.”

  Willows stared at her for a moment, and then shook his head in disbelief. “You’ve got to be kidding. It’s crazy. Why would he do something so stupid?”

  “Not stupid, risky. But it was a calculated risk. He knew exactly what he was doing.” Parker hesitated a moment and then said, “I went right through the master list of all the members of the singles club. Miriam Okahashi is the only one who lived or worked within a ten-block radius of the deli.”

  Willows still
wasn’t convinced. “The way I see it, the killer was checking out Okahashi’s routine. Or, more likely, he was casing the brick building across the street, making sure he didn’t have to worry about a security guard. It was late at night. He saw the deli and decided to grab something to eat, knowing he might have a long wait at the parking lot. But Tate and Moore and Foster left the bar earlier than he’d expected, and he didn’t have time to finish his snack.” Willows shrugged. “Or maybe he lives or works in the vicinity. Dropped down to the deli for a bite to eat and Okahashi happened to wander in. He saw her and recognized her. Followed her back to her office on impulse, decided to add her to his list. Just one of those things, a coincidence.”

  “You like coincidences?” said Parker. “Try this one. The day after Phasia Palinkas was shot, we found that the bullet that killed her came from the sporting goods store right across the street from where she dropped.”

  “Culver’s,” said Willows.

  “Remember the meeting in Bradley’s office, when Atkinson said something about the sniper rubbing our faces in it?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “Same message, Jack. If we’d known where they’d come from, the two spent cartridges left in the gas station when Alice Palm was shot would’ve led us straight to Phasia Palinkas.”

  Willows nodded, thinking back. He recalled with almost preternatural clarity the two gleaming brass shells standing side by side on the counter of the abandoned gas station. He remembered the ribbons of light sifting through the gaps in the wooden hoarding, the brittle, oddly satisfying crunch of broken glass beneath his feet. He saw the rain pounding down, striking white sparks on the asphalt, the bus stranded in the middle of the intersection, windows ablaze with light.

  Alice Palm, all in a heap.

  “Pink earmuffs.”

  “What?” said Parker

  “You’ve made a tenuous connection between Alice Palm and Phasia Palinkas, the three guys who were shot in the parking lot, and Miriam Okahashi. But what about all the rest of the junk we’ve picked up all over the city? What about, for example, the pink earmuffs left on the sidewalk next to Phasia Palinkas’ body?”