The Pariah (The Lt. Hastings Mysteries)

by Collin Wilcox

  “I’m on till six. Where’m I going?” The blue-black lips twisted into a weary cop-hater’s sneer.

  Penziner had taken a straight-backed chair from a vacant room and was sitting in the hallway. One uniformed man stood beside the door to 325, another stood at one end of the hallway, beside the staircase. From one end to the other, the hallway was lit with a line of red bulbs. Seeing Canelli, Penziner got to his feet.

  “A half hour exactly,” Penziner said. “I’m impressed.”

  “You want to hang around?” Canelli asked, “or would you just as soon go?”

  “I’d just as soon go. I already told you, this doesn’t agree with my stomach, all this. Especially the goddamn smell.”

  “No problem.” Canelli took a notebook and ballpoint pen from the pocket of his tan windbreaker. “What’ve you got for me?”

  “Her name was Amy MacFarland. I never talked to her, never busted her. She was from out of town, though, I know that. But that’s all of them, out-of-towners, runaways.”

  “Who’s her pimp?”

  “A black guy named Dancer Browne. He was parked right across the street when I got here, cool as shit.”

  “Will he stay put?”

  “Oh, sure.” Penziner’s long, lean face registered grudging admiration as he said, “Dancer’s—what—the king of Mason Street. He went to San Francisco State for a couple of years, on a basketball scholarship. He’s tall, about six five. And smart, too, smart as hell. He only works white girls—four, five of them. He won’t run anywhere, take my word. He’s got too much going on here.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Nothing. I’ll ask around, though, see what I can turn up. She came in with a trick, I think. So it’s probably him that did it.”

  Canelli nodded, pocketed his notebook. “Keep in touch, okay?”

  “Yeah, okay. See you, Joe.” Penziner nodded and walked down the garishly lit hallway to the staircase. Canelli drew a deep breath and turned to face the door of room 325. He would make his preliminary examination, then call the duty lieutenant.

  3

  ON THE TV SCREEN, the president was making hard eye contact with the camera at the conclusion of a rebroadcast speech that had warned of Communism’s new menace to the Western Hemisphere. Sitting beside Ann on their living room sofa, Hastings yawned, lifted his arms high above his head, flexed his fingers, then touched Ann on the forearm. She turned, smiled at him.

  “How about some hot chocolate?” she asked.

  “Fine. I’ll put the garbage cans out.”

  “The newspapers, too.”

  “Right.” He watched her as she got up, switched off the TV, walked to the archway that opened onto the long hallway leading back to the rear of the large Victorian flat. She wore faded blue jeans and a plaid cotton shirt, shirt-tail out. Her long tawny hair was fastened in a pony tail. Ann was a quiet, reserved woman, and she moved accordingly: firmly, self-sufficiently, economically. Literally from the first moment they’d met, her body had excited him. She’d been dressed as she was dressed now, in jeans, with her hair in a pony tail, wearing no makeup. It had been the same time of night, too: a little after eleven. Dan, her teenage son, had been a material witness in a homicide, and briefly a suspect. With his shield in his left hand, Hastings had pressed Ann’s door buzzer with his right hand. Then, reflexively, he’d stepped back, unbuttoned his jacket, put his right hand on the butt of his revolver. When the door opened, he’d—

  In the hallway, the telephone rang. Quickly, mindful of Ann’s two sleeping sons, Hastings rose, went to the phone.

  “Yes?”

  “Hi, Lieutenant. It’s Canelli.”

  Automatically, Hastings noted the time as he clicked a ballpoint pen over the notepad that was always beside the phone. He was about to go on duty.

  “What’s up?”

  “It’s a dead hooker down on Mason Street, at the Bayside Hotel, in the three hundred block. It happened a little after ten o’clock, according to the way I get it. She was strangled. All I got is a general description of the guy that probably did it. They came in a little after ten, like I said. Maybe ten minutes later the guy left, through the lobby.”

  “Is the crew there?”

  “The ME’s here. McCarville. Our lab guys haven’t showed up yet. I figured—you know—a hooker, it’s no big deal. So I didn’t put the rush on them.”

  “Okay, I’ll be down in forty-five minutes or so.”

  “Right.”

  Hastings cradled the phone and turned to face Ann, who stood in the doorway to the kitchen. They’d been living together for a little more than a year. Already, she’d gotten accustomed to the phone calls that could come on Hasting’s duty nights. Or, if not accustomed, at least resigned.

  “The chocolate’s almost ready,” she said quietly.

  “Good. I’ll just have time.”

  As he stripped off his rubber gloves and straightened over the body, McCarville winced, pressing both hands into the small of his back. McCarville was a small, trim, middle-aged man, totally bald, nattily dressed. As he turned to face Hastings, he grimaced.

  “The last time we met like this,” McCarville said, “it seems to me I was complaining about my back then, too.”

  “No better, eh?”

  “Worse, I think.”

  “Do I ask if you went to a doctor?”

  The grimace twisted into an expression of long-suffering patience. “I’d rather you didn’t.”

  “Well …” Hastings gestured to the dead woman. “What’s the word?”

  “Pretty straightforward,” McCarville answered. “She hasn’t lost any internal temperature, which means she’s been dead two hours or less. Without doubt, she was strangled by something like a coarse rope, maybe three quarters of an inch in diameter. Just eyeballing her, I’d say she was in her twenties, in poor health, probably malnourished. And, yes, she had needle marks on both arms and both legs.” Spreading his hands, he shrugged. “And that’s pretty much it. The autopsy might hand you some surprises, but I doubt it.” He gestured to the room’s open doorway, where a gurney waited. “Want us to take her away?”

  Hastings looked inquiringly at Canelli. “Have we got everything? Plenty of pictures?”

  Canelli nodded. “Plenty.”

  “Okay—” Hastings stepped back, standing with Canelli beside the double bed. Briskly, the two coroner’s deputies entered the small room, spread a green plastic sheet on the floor, rolled the body onto the sheet, used black elastic straps to secure it. The gurney was brought in and lowered. Grunting, the two deputies squatted, nodded to each other, heaved the body up.

  “Light,” one of the deputies said. “Less than a hundred, I’d say.”

  As Hastings watched the deputies wheel the body out into the hallway he looked at his watch. The time was ten minutes past midnight. Elapsed time: two hours since someone had come up to this room with Amy MacFarland, quietly closed the door, and killed her.

  Or, more accurately, the murderer had probably snuffed her. For an extra charge, she’d probably let him play with the limits. She’d gambled with her life, and lost. Poor Amy MacFarland. She probably wouldn’t even get an obituary in the next day’s newspaper.

  “So what’ve we got?” Hastings asked. “Who’ve you talked to?”

  “Just the room clerk,” Canelli answered. “And it was a zero, what he had to say. He claims he didn’t even notice the guy when they came in. Her, he remembered. I mean, that’s his job, to keep track of the hookers, keep track of the money. But the tricks, he claims, they all look alike.”

  “Do you believe him?”

  Canelli’s swarthy moon face registered brow-furrowed concentration as he considered. “Well, if I had to say yes or no then I guess I’d have to say yes. I mean, what’s he got to lose, giving us a description of the guy?”

  “What about her pimp?”

  “A guy named Dancer Browne. Bernie Penziner—he’s on the Tenderloin beat now—he told Dancer to stay available.
He’s parked just down the block, in a big white and blue Continental. God, he’s some character. I mean, these pimps’re all—you know—cool. But Dancer, he’s supercool.”

  “I’ll talk to him. Is he black?”

  “Yeah. Tall, and black. He used to play basketball at State, according to Bernie.” Canelli smiled. “How about that—an athlete, down here pimping.”

  “I’ll see what he says. You stay here—” Hastings gestured to a lab technician who was leisurely dusting a badly chipped bureau for fingerprints. “Make sure it all gets done. I’ll be back in a half hour or so.”

  “Yessir.”

  Hastings stooped, pressed his shield against the Continental’s passenger window and knocked on the glass with his free hand. Behind the wheel, Dancer smiled, lifted a forefinger in a with-it salute, and leaned across to open the door.

  “I’m Lieutenant Frank Hastings. Homicide.”

  “Hey—” The lazy smile widened, registering a special pleasure. “Hey, I know you. I saw you on TV, not too long ago. Didn’t I?”

  Deciding to ignore the question, Hastings half turned in his seat to face the other man. On a warm September night, The Dancer was wearing the obligatory two-hundred-dollar sports shirt opened deep at the neck to reveal an ebony chest festooned with gold chains. Both his hair and his beard were close-cropped. Behind designer glasses, his eyes were expressive, constantly in motion. His mouth was mobile. His manner was completely relaxed, utterly assured.

  “Tell me about Amy MacFarland.”

  “Oh, yeah …” Dancer sighed heavily, gravely shook his head. “It’s terrible, these crazies.”

  “She was one of your girls.”

  Observing the conventions, Dancer frowned, elaborately puzzled. “How do you mean, ‘one of my girls’?”

  “I mean that she worked for you, turning tricks.”

  Dancer’s full lips curved into an amused smile. Allowing a small silence to lengthen, he took time to assess the other man: about forty years old, give or take. A big, muscular man, one of the quiet ones, a man who would think first and then hit—hard.

  Continuing the mandatory pattern of ritual responses, Dancer spread his hands, pantomiming an aggrieved innocence. “I just don’t know what you mean, Lieutenant. No idea.”

  “You’re wasting my time, Dancer. I was getting ready for bed when this call came in. Don’t jerk me around. I’m not in the mood.”

  Judging that the time had come for plain talk, Dancer asked, “So what’re we talking? One on one?”

  “That’s how we’re talking. I don’t care who you’re running, where your money comes from. That’s between you and Vice, whatever you work out. But I’ve got a dead body, and I need a suspect to go with it. I want some answers—now. Then I want to go home and get some sleep. Clear?”

  Eyes veiled, Dancer smiled. Yes, he and Hastings could work together.

  “You know how it goes, Dancer. It’s the hard way or the easy way. Your choice.”

  Nodding acceptance of the terms, Dancer spoke quietly, concisely: “She came to town about four months ago, I guess it was, from New York, so she said. She was a junkie—had been, for a year or two, I’d say. So I—you know—tried to make it a little easier for her, put her in touch with some people.” He shrugged. “That’s about it.”

  With his notebook on his knee, Hastings asked, “Where’d she live?”

  “I don’t know.” Saying it, Dancer met the other man’s eyes squarely, signifying that, really, he was telling the truth. “I mean, she moved around a lot. All I know, she’d show up down here, whenever she felt like it. She’d just—you know—see the car, and we’d talk. Then she’d go about her business.”

  “How much did she charge?”

  “Fifty. Hopefully.”

  “What about tonight? Tell me about tonight.”

  “Yeah—” He nodded, once more made full, complete eye contact. “Well, I was parked just a few spaces up, on this side of the street.” As the other man pointed, Hastings caught the sparkle of a large diamond on his little finger. “And I happened to see Amy, across the street, there—” He pointed again. “She was—you know—hitting on the tourists. She hit on maybe three or four, but didn’t score. But then, after a while, she connected with this guy. They talked for a minute or so, not long, and then they—you know—went into the hotel, there—the Bayside. And that was it, pretty much.”

  “What time was this?”

  “Just about ten, I’d say.”

  “Describe him, the trick.”

  “Yeah, well, that was interesting. I mean, they were talking right in front of a sign, so I got a pretty good look at him. And I remember thinking he looked weird. I mean, his face was a blank, you know. Just a real pale blank, with these empty, stone eyes.”

  “How old was he?”

  Dancer shrugged. “Twenty-five, thirty, maybe. No more.”

  “How was he dressed?”

  “Like a tourist, I’d say—just your standard out-of-towner.”

  “Was he wearing a tie?”

  “No, no tie. I didn’t pay much attention, though. But I remember that he wasn’t wearing a tie. Maybe he had a—you know—a polyester sports jacket, like that.”

  “How tall?”

  “Medium. Five ten, maybe. Slim.”

  “Hair color?”

  “Blond. Dark blond, maybe. Regular cut.” He shrugged again. “A tourist, like I said. Just your standard tourist from New Jersey, looking for some action …” Dancer paused, looked across the street, toward the spot where he’d last seen Amy MacFarland. “Except for those eyes,” he said thoughtfully. “They were strange, those eyes. Spooky.”

  “You’d recognize him again.” It was a statement, not a question.

  Dancer looked at the big, quiet-spoken lieutenant, the man with the calm, hard eyes. They’d made a deal, the two of them: the standard deal. If he cooperated, he’d earn points—for himself, for his girls, money in the bank.

  But identifying someone—going public, downtown—that was never part of the standard deal. Never.

  “I’m not talking about a lineup,” Hastings said. “Nothing like that. Nothing downtown.”

  “Ah …” Dancer nodded, tried not to reveal the relief he felt.

  “But if we turn up anything, I’ll want to run him by you.” As he spoke, Hastings opened the passenger’s door. “You weren’t planning to leave town.” It was another statement: flat, cold, businesslike.

  Dancer smiled. “Man, I haven’t left this town in years. I haven’t left this block in years. You want to find me, here I’ll be.”

  “Good.” Hastings nodded, got out of the car, crossed the street in the direction of the Bayside Hotel.

  Sitting on the double bed, Canelli watched the last of the lab technicians leave the room before he dropped his eyes to the outline of Amy MacFarland’s body chalked on the stained carpeting. Seated in the room’s only chair, Hastings was also looking down at the outline. Slowly, somberly, Canelli shook his head.

  “You know,” Canelli said, “it’s sad when you think about it. I mean, here’s this girl—” He gestured. “For all we know, she could’ve been a—a bank president’s daughter, or something. But no matter, she probably had parents who loved her, and everything. So then she starts in with drugs, and probably her folks threw her out, or whatever. So this is the way she ends up—her, and thousands like her. But the hell of it is, no one really cares. You know?”

  Hastings nodded, then shrugged. “Nobody ever said life was fair, Canelli.”

  “Yeah—” Vehemently now, Canelli nodded. “That’s it, Lieutenant. I mean, if this was the Fairmont, or somewhere, there’d be photographers and reporters, and …” He sighed, shook his head, studied the body’s outline with soft brown eyes. Then: “It’s like you say. It’s just not fair.”

  Heavily, Hastings rose to his feet. The time was almost two, and fatigue had suddenly overtaken him.

  “If you’re trying to make me feel guilty, Canelli, you a
ren’t succeeding. I’m going home, and I’m going to sleep. And after you lock up, I’d advise you to do the same. I’ll see you at the office tomorrow morning. About ten, or maybe a little later.”

  4

  SITTING SLUMPED BEHIND HIS desk, Hastings was staring with unfocused eyes at an interoffice memo outlining Chief Dwyer’s new guidelines on overtime policy for nonuniformed personnel when the intercom button lit up. Wearily, he lifted the phone.

  “Hastings.”

  “Yeah, this is Peirce, Lieutenant. There’s a Mr. Draper here, to see someone in Homicide. Walter Draper. He’s with the FBI, from Washington.” After a short pause Peirce added, “Lieutenant Friedman just left for court.”

  “Okay, give me five minutes, then send him—no, bring him in.”

  “Right.”

  Walter Draper was a dapper man of medium height and weight, stylishly dressed, with prep school manners and a small, fastidiously trimmed moustache. He was about thirty years old, slightly balding, dressed in a pinstriped suit, white shirt, and regimental tie. Moving smoothly, precisely, he sat in Hastings’s visitor’s chair, arranged his trouser creases and smiled. It was a small, tight, tactical smile, slightly condescending.

  “I’m sure you’re busy, Lieutenant Hastings, so I’ll come right to the point.” As he spoke, Draper took a business card from his vest pocket and snapped it down on Hastings’s desk. The card identified Draper as an assistant supervisor, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Washington, D.C.

  “I’m with the Joint Task Force on Non-Causal Related Crime.” Draper paused, looking expectantly at Hastings. Yes, Hastings had heard of the task force, seen the flyers from Washington, one of dozens that crossed his desk each week. But, no, he couldn’t remember what the task force was meant to accomplish.

  “It’s not registering, I see.” Draper’s voice was both tolerant and wearily resigned. Already, Hastings had consigned Draper to the nameless, faceless ranks of Ivy League FBI agents, one of hundreds he’d dealt with over the years. Only once had he ever met an FBI man he’d liked.

  Stifling a yawn, Hastings shook his head. “I remember the bulletins. But that’s all, I’m afraid.”