by Neal Arbic
“Everyone’s innocent until proven guilty! How can you live with yourself? We’re cops. We’re supposed to be civilized.”
“Let me ask you, do you honestly think we can clean up those streets following every procedure, every Departmental regulation? Horseshit. It’s a fuckin’ war out there! What do you think we’re doing on the street?”
“Keeping law and order!”
“That’s right, and it only works because every cop is legally sanctioned to use whatever violence necessary. A man don’t stop beating his wife ‘cause I ask politely. He stops ‘cause I’m wearing a night stick and gun, and knows I have the license to use ‘em.”
Miles passed.
The lights of civilization appeared on the horizon. Jack broke. “When I came home from WWII, they gave me a parade, medals, kisses …respect. Not like now. Now they call returning soldiers from Vietnam ‘baby killers.’
“After my plane got all shot up, I just laid there in a hospital bed…for months. We didn’t have TV back then and there was no goddamn radio on my ward. So I laid there - thinking - about the war, about my job: dropping bombs. You know, I dropped a hell of a lot of ordnance over Berlin, Dresden, a dozen cities. We carpet bombed Hamburg – 40,000 died in a single night. There must have been some soldiers there: on leave, a few guards, but who was I really killing? Women and children. School girls. A lot of old men and babies are dead because of me. But I was a hero for killing thousands of innocent people. They didn’t deserve to die. But that guy! That degenerate scumbag! Don’t think I’m going to lose a wink of sleep over rubbing out a rat like that!”
Delware didn’t answer, his silence more condemning than words.
Jack stared at the dark road ahead. “If tonight was made public, I’d go to jail…who knows, with all you hippie communists today, I might even get the chair. But I was a hero for killing thousands of innocent children.” Jack looked out across the desert night. “Know why I killed him?”
Delware didn’t respond, but he wanted to know.
Jack spit out the window. “Cause one day, you’re gonna find yourself a woman who’s going to tame you. And you’re going to like it. Then you’ll have a baby - a baby girl who walks to school every day. And you know what? She’ll be safe, because of what I did tonight. She won’t be raped or molested because he won’t be waiting and watching on the street corner for her. No jury could do that for you. No jail could keep him locked up forever. The law would let him go, sooner or later. You can judge me now. But you wait, a few years of this racket - you’ll be watching guys like that go free, on technicalities, because a pinkie, hippie loving jury can’t recognize a psychopath when they see one, because they can’t tell when someone’s lying…or telling the truth.”
Delware barked, “Fuck you, Jack!”
Jack smiled. “You’re not mad at me, kid. You’re mad at yourself - ‘cause I showed you what type of cop you are. You know why I took you? Because I wanted to show you how it’s done. Because that’s what I said to the old cop who showed me Death Valley, I said ‘fuck you’ to my first partner on Homicide. And you know what? He didn’t kill the pervert. He let him go to trial…because of me. And you know what happened? Years later, I was working a case, this dead little girl. We never found her killer. It broke my fuckin’ heart. And I wondered, I always wondered if it was him: the pervert I begged my partner to let get away with mere jail time.
“The case was over and I still couldn’t get that thought out of my head. So I searched and found him. I broke into his house when he was at work. He had a dirt basement and the only thing down there was a shovel. Not one goddamn thing down there. Just a dirt floor and a long handled shovel. I found five, maybe six…corpses, small ones. Children. I just waited with that shovel in my hand. When he came home, I beat him with it. I took him to Death Valley, and did what I should have let my partner do all those years ago. I shot him.
“To make sure…he didn’t get off.
“That guy back there tonight, he wasn’t innocent.
“So, judge me tonight. But this racket will show you sides of yourself you never believed existed. Put you in situations where you do things you never imagined - you’d rather forget. Just wait, kid. LA ain’t through with you yet. Welcome to The White Man’s Burden. And if I’m right about you, if you really care about what you’re suppose to be doing out here with that badge and gun, then one day…you’ll make sure.
“You’ll make sure rats like that meet with justice…head on.”
The Packard entered the city. When they parked out front of headquarters, the desert seemed like just a bad dream. Dawn was breaking.
Delware opened his door, got out and paused. He was a dark shadow in the twilight. It seemed he might just walk away, but finally he turned to Jack. “You don’t know what justice looks like.”
Jack looked up. “Kid, there’s plenty of justice at the end of a gun.”
Delware rested an elbow on the open door, the other on the roof. Shaking his head, he dropped it. “You’re right about me, Jack. I won’t squeal. But you’re wrong about the cop I’m going to be. I’ll never do what you did, because I’m black.
“I had an uncle lynched in Alabama. He was with me and my father when a mob grabbed him. They said he raped a white woman that evening - but he was with us - the whole night. They hung him…right in front of me. I was nine years old, Jack. No trial, no lawyer, no due process. We tried to tell the mob he had been with us. No one listened. I knew my uncle all my life and I watched him dangling at the end of that rope - an intelligent, innocent man. That’s why my father got us out of the south. Because any hysterical white woman could have you lynched. Any guy who committed a crime could claim he saw you, a black man, do it. No trial, Jack, just vigilante lynching. My uncle was a chief organizer of the black vote in the south. Isn’t that interesting? Almost convenient, wouldn’t you say?
Delware looked into Jack’s eyes. “Well, Jack, both you and I know it was and never will be investigated. So there’s another side to your type of justice, Jack. There always is.”
Delware slammed the door.
Thursday, October 2nd, 1969, 3:10 PM
The desert was blinding, its dunes distorted by rippling waves of heat. Even with the windows down, nothing but hot air hit their faces. Sweat dripped from Delware’s forehead onto Dr. Ellroy’s files as he crosschecked commune members’ names with arrest reports from Robbery Division. Jack was bleary-eyed, his jacket dusty with sand.
Delware took a long hateful look at Death Valley. “That’s it, Jack. That’s all the communes. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
Jack laughed. “This place is Hell. Only the Devil himself could stand it, but, kid, we got one more.”
“Shit, Jack! I’m outta files.”
“Hey, we’re out here, aren’t we?! We haven’t done Spahn Ranch.”
Delware rolled his eyes and threw up his hands. “You’re trying to kill me!”
Jack just smiled.
Delware sneered. “I don’t have that file. We’ll do it tomorrow.”
“No, we’ll do it today. It’s on our way back. Kid, it’s right over the hill there.”
“No, Jack! I’m gonna lose my mind out here. We’re so far from LA, the radio’s been dead for hours. And I can’t take one more commune. I’m thirsty as hell and we’re out of water!”
“What, you tired?”
“Yeah!”
Jack laughed. “Kid, you’re soft. Back in my day there was not such thing as tired. My mother use to push a broom and scrub a wooden floor till it sparkled. You kids got washing machines, and vacuum cleaners and whine that you’re tired.”
Delware pointed an accusatory finger. “You just want to see that wishing well thing, don’t you? Don’t think I don’t remember!”
Jack grinned. “It’s called the Bottomless Pit.”
Delware threw himself back in his seat. “Bottomless Pit?! It’s a fuckin’ well! I’m dying in the desert and you wanna stroll down memory lane!
”
“Hey! It’s on our list, isn’t it?”
“Not today! Christ!”
“Well, it is now. Besides, this will be quick. I know the ranch. My dad took me horseback riding here all the time and-” He added gleefully, “we’ll see if the Bottomless Pit is still there.”
The sign came out of the dunes. A wooden plank job with faded paint: Spahn Ranch.
The radio spurted, “Detective Middleton, are you there?”
Jack hit the brakes, the Packard skidded and disappeared in a cloud of dust. Inside, Jack grabbed the mic. “Middleton here.”
“Detective, we’ve been trying you all day. We have another 185 - bloody messages on the walls. At 3301 Waverly Drive.”
Jack looked up, stunned. The dust cleared and the Spahn Ranch sign reappeared. “Shit! It’s just around the bend.” Jack didn’t feel it before, but now he did. It was more than just seeing the Bottomless Pit; his gut told him this place was important.
“Holy shit, Jack! What are you doing? Turn this thing around!”
Jack didn’t move.
“Jack! We gotta go!”
Jack’s eyes fixed on the sign. “I got a feeling, kid.”
“What?”
“I’m not sure, but I think we should check out this commune first.”
“Are you kidding? There’s been another murder. Dirk, the entire Department, is at the scene now, probably trampling all the evidence as we speak.”
Jack nodded, his eyes still on the sign. “That’s right, kid. But-.”
Delware punched the dashboard. ‘Damn you!”
Jack snapped out of it. “Hey, be careful with the car!” He met Delware’s fierce stare and saw his partner was clearly at his edge. Jack shook his head. “OK, OK, kid. We’re going.”
He spun the car around, consoling himself that the ranch would still be there tomorrow.
***
Jack sped. Delware stewed.
Jack glanced over. “Calm down, kid. We’re getting there.”
Delware curled his lip at Jack.
“Kid, even at this speed, we’re still an hour out, so CALM DOWN!”
Delware punched the dashboard. “I’m sick of this case and I’m sick of you! You’re a criminal, Jack - with a badge and gun! And here I’m chained to a madman in the middle of the desert when the action is miles away in LA! And all your secrecy bullshit! Never telling me anything! Follow your mysterious hunches! I’m sick of it!”
“OK, kid! Calm the fuck down before you break something! You wanna know something? Well, go ahead! Ask away! We got all the time in the world.”
“What happened in that alley way?! Who was that goddamn black church lady who kissed you?”
“Kissed me!?” Jack looked at Delware like he was crazy, then it dawned on him, “Oh, she did.” He got defensive. “That was a peck on the cheek, don’t go around saying-”
“Tell me! What happened in Watts?”
Jacked turned to Delware, looked him over, and surrendered. “Gwynette Sanders.”
“Who?”
“She was eight years old in ‘47. That alleyway is where we found her.”
“And the lady that kissed you?”
“That was her mother. That day was the anniversary of her death. Patty was my old partner then, for many years we went there together on the anniversary.”
“Why?”
“We never solved it. It got a lot of press for a colored girl – on her way home from Sunday school, father was a famous jazz musician. My first big case. We worked it for over a year, hundreds of leads, field interviews, endless interrogations, same suspects again and again. But it never broke. We were young and we made mistakes. I didn’t read it right from the beginning.”
Jack looked tired, sad beaten eyes.
Delware whispered, “You give up?”
Jack shook his head. “The newspapers forgot Gwynette. The community leaders moved on to other issues. The Department cut Patty loose and sent him on another case. For a while it was just me. Then, the Department pulled the plug.” He shrugged. “That was it.”
“That was it?”
“My sergeant walked in and told me to clear off my desk. I thought I was through in Homicide, but he sent me on a new squeal. When I protested, my sergeant said, ‘She’s just another colored girl from Watts. She’s not important, Jack.’”
***
The Packard pulled up to Waverly Drive. The street was cordoned off, a growing crowd packing behind the barricades.
Jack pulled over and glanced up at the houses sloping up the hill. “There’s no use trying to get through, we’ll park here.”
***
The afternoon was fading fast. Jack and Delware made their way through the crowd and a line of police sawhorses. They passed the grim carnival of what was death in LA:
a dozen patrol cars choked the street, a few up on the sidewalks - lights still flashing, neighbors rubbernecked out windows and the end of driveways where they were held at bay by bleary-eyed patrolmen, sergeants pulling news photographers off the mansion gate - cameras flashing. Crime Lab guys grabbing equipment from their van, two deputies smoking inside a photo car and the crew from the L.A. County Coroner pulling gurneys from their wagon.
Up the driveway, the traffic was just as bad. Jack turned to Delware, “Well, they’re doing a bang-up job of trampling any evidence in the front of the house. Let’s circle round back.”
The driveway extended behind the house. They saw a small sailboat up on a trailer, no one was around. Jack took his time, looking for signs of passage in the grass, along the back stairs. He looked at all the windows: no slashed screens.
They entered through the back door. Stepping into the kitchen, Jack paused. There on the white fridge door, written in blood, were the words, “Helter Skelter.”
Stepping into the crowded living room, they saw a body on the floor. The police photographers were there, flashbulbs going off. A man in his fifties lay beside a couch: a carving fork jutting from his stomach, a steak knife deep into his throat. Through a doorway Jack saw a bedroom with a woman in her forties sprawled on the floor. “Pigs” and “Rise” written in blood on the walls. Dirk eyed Jack. Dirk’s team turned their heads and their talk stopped.
Jack walked by the man’s body, glancing at the stab wounds, too numerous to count. He entered the bedroom, estimating over 40 stab wounds on the female.
Stepping back into the living room, Dirk stood waiting.
Jack smiled. Dirk half smiled.
Jack rubbed his gray crew cut. “It’s a series.”
Dirk gave a silent laugh. “At a glance, but we’ve been here all day.”
Jack jabbed a finger into Dirk’s chest. “This proves me right. It’s the same MO!!”
“That’s what they want us to think - the two cases are unrelated.”
Jack looked at Dirk with unbelieving eyes.
Dirk grinned. “It’s a copy cat, to throw us off. I’m going to let Duran and Millis take this one.”
“Are you blind? You’re saying these are unrelated?”
“Beyond the multiple victims, bloody lyrics…” He pointed to the bloody letters on the walls. “No, I don’t see any connection, these victims and the Tate murders are too widely removed. There are no similarities linking the victims. You’re really late on the scene, maybe you should have arrived sooner and-”
“Shut up, will ya!” Jack paced. “Are we not standing in a mansion in LA?”
“I wouldn’t call this ‘a mansion.’ We’re a long way from Hollywood, Jack, a long way. Right now, we found no links between these victims and the Tate murders. They…” he pointed to the bodies, “aren’t movies stars and…no drugs were found in this house.” Dirk gave Jack an all-knowing look. “I know you’ve been off on your own, but we got a good lead and suspects on the Tate murders. You’re the only one in the Department looking for a series. The rest of us are basing our investigation on facts. Maybe if you were working a little closer with my team-”
Dirk placed his hands on his hips. “All that means is the killer arrived unarmed.”
Jack stood staring at Dirk with incredulous eyes.
“Like I said, Jack, it’s a copy cat.”
“No, our guy wants credit for his kills.”
Dirk was going red. “These details were all over the papers. Anyone could make like the Tate murders, after the fact, to cover their trail!”
