by Reason of Sanity

by Gene Grossman

  No more than five minutes pass by when my phone rings and I see it’s 1-800-autopsy calling. “Hello, Victor?”

  “Yes Mister Sharp, what can I do for you today?” “I’ve got another assignment. As you’ve probably seen on the news, my client died in the courtroom and the county has decided not to perform an autopsy.”

  “You think there was foul play?”

  “No Victor, I don’t think there was any foul play, but I really would like to know what he died from. I may be talking to his wife and kids soon, and I want to be able to have some answers for them.”

  “Well Mister Sharp, I’d like to help you out, but our van is really busy this week. There was a bad freeway crash down in San Diego and our mobile lab was called down there to help out. Can this wait another week or two?”

  “I don’t think so. The county isn’t in the body warehousing business and if I don’t get Harold’s body out of their morgue they may dispose of it, because nobody else has claimed it.”

  “Well maybe if you call a funeral home, you can get them to pick up the remains and bring it over here. They’ll probably charge a couple of hundred but at least the body will be picked up for us.”

  “Okay Victor, I’ll make some arrangements to get it over to your place tomorrow, so please clear some room for it.”

  After hanging up I make some calls to various funeral homes, only to learn that the only way they’ll do a pick-up is if they get the funeral too. It’s bad enough that I’ll have to pay a couple of grand for the autopsy – I don’t want to have to spring for another five thousand for a funeral too. If I’m lucky, the court’s payment to me for handling Harold’s case will probably give me just enough for the autopsy and some Myra jumping in Maui. I don’t want to go into debt just to be a nice guy. There must be another way to get Harold to Victor’s place.

  Every once in a while, a brilliant thought comes along. Harold’s body will easily fit in the back of Stuart’s air-conditioned armored van. It’s perfect for transporting a body. Now all I have to do is talk Stuart into having Vinnie do the heavy lifting. I dial Stuart’s number and after a minute of small talk, I try to lead into the real reason for my call.

  “Listen Stu, I was wondering if you and Vinnie could do me a small favor. I need a box picked up downtown and delivered out near Pasadena. Would that be possible? I’ll be glad to pay fifty bucks for the driver’s time.”

  “Sure Pete, I think that can be arranged. What’s in the box? Nothing illegal, I hope.”

  I was afraid he’d ask about that. I don’t want to lie to him but at the same time, I’d rather not let him know that I’m turning his beautiful armored van into a hearse. “Stu, I’d like to tell you but it might be a violation of the lawyer-client privilege, so if you don’t mind, I’d rather not say anything until the case is over. Then, I’ll tell you all about it.”

  He bit. “Okay my friend, I understand. I’ll call Vinnie and tell him he’s making a non-funeral run tomorrow morning. Email me the pick-up and delivery info and I’ll get it done for you.”

  Great. And I didn’t really have to lie to him, because I still am working on a case with Harold involved.

  Next afternoon the phone rings and my display shows that it’s Stuart calling. “Hello Stu, what’s up?”

  “Pete, you really should have told me what Vinnie was picking up for you.”

  “Why? What’s the difference?”

  “The difference is that if I would have known what it was, maybe Vinnie wouldn’t be in jail now.”

  If I live to be a hundred, I’ll never understand how a guy like Vinnie can manage to get thrown in jail so often. I haven’t heard the story yet but I have a feeling that it’ll be unbelievable. Per Stuart’s request, I drive to the Valley Services Division of the Los Angeles Police Department in Van Nuys. When I get there, both Stuart and the station’s watch commander, Lieutenant Evans, are waiting for me.

  After explaining to Evans the whole story about how Vinnie was doing me a favor by delivering Harold’s body from one morgue to another, he surprises me with a question. “Hey, aren’t you the guys who broke up that bank robbery gang?” Fame is wonderful. The cop recognizes us.

  “That’s right Lieutenant and if I can get our crime-fighting partner out of your lockup, we can finish up working on this case.”

  “Will it be something going down here in the Valley?” He must smell a big bust in the offing.

  “You never know, but I’ll tell you what: if I have to call for back-up, you’re the one I’ll ask for. So start wearing your best uniform to work each day for the next week, because you’ll want to look good for the television cameras.”

  He must have believed I was going to make a hero out of him, because less than five minutes later Vinnie was out in the lobby waiting for us – with his girlfriend Olive – and she was definitely not a happy camper. He tried desperately to explain to her what happened, but she wasn’t having any of it. As soon as she was out of jail, she was out of there. I heard her calling for a cab on her cell phone as she walked right on past us and out of the building. Vinnie couldn’t wait to tell his story, but first he wanted an apology from me. Stuart interceded and explained that it was some attorney-client privilege ‘stuff,’ so Vinnie backed off, deciding to tell me his story instead.

  Olive always liked guys in uniform, so when Vinnie finally became one, she fell hard. And driving a big armored truck helped accentuate the attraction she felt for him. She kept pressing him to take her for a ride in the truck, but there never seemed to be a day off without a funeral until today – so he invited her to join him on his pickup and delivery. As Vinnie explains it, I struggle to keep a straight face. From what he tells me, it sounds like a foreign, Jacques Tati film.

  Neither one of them knew what the cargo was, so they had a grand time chatting about their future and didn’t pay any attention to the sheetcovered gurney that was being loaded into the back of the truck.

  Along the way, they decide to stop off at a Burger Queen drive-thru place to get some cheeseburgers. Before getting to the fast food place, Olive asks Vinnie if he would please stop off at a gas station so she can take a leak. Not being anything like her boyfriend, she prefers toilets to trees. Vinnie, being so proud of the grand vehicle he’s driving, tells her not to worry… the truck is equipped with it’s own private toilet. All she has to do is go through the door behind the seats and make herself comfortable. Olive does as told, sees the port-a-potty and sits down to take her leak.

  While she’s sitting there minding her own business, she sees that directly in front of her is some sheet-covered thing on wheels and notices that there’s a strange odor coming from it. At the same time, Vinnie spots a drive-thru fast-food place, so he pulls in, orders some food, and then pulls up to the cashier’s window to pay for and pick up the food.

  Unfortunately, he misjudges the narrowness of the drive-thru lane, which wasn’t designed for vehicles as wide as his truck. The result of this slight error in his judgment results in one of the truck’s front wheels hitting and then going up onto the driveway’s curb.

  Ordinarily this wouldn’t be a very damaging incident, but in this case, it tosses poor Harold’s body off of the gurney and onto Olive’s lap.

  I don’t know how the average person would react, taking a leak in the back of a truck and having a corpse jump on you, but Olive is slightly upset. Well, maybe slightly upset is in understatement. She comes unglued, jumps up in a panic and rushes for the back doors of the truck, to escape from the stinking corpse that has just attacked her and is still in her lap.

  Unbeknownst to Vinnie, Olive and Harold, the fast-food drive-thru place also sells coffee and donuts, so directly behind Vinnie’s truck is a blackand-white L.A.P.D. police car with two uniformed officers.

  I can only imagine their surprise when they see the back doors of the truck in front of them fly open and Olive diving out onto the hood of their police car, complete with Harold on her lap and her panties still down beneath her
knees. I’ve heard that the Los Angeles Police Department has a very thorough training program, but I doubt if a situation like this one is in their books… although from now on, it probably might be.

  This must have really been a Kodak moment, but there’s never a camera around when you need one

  – unless the fast-food place had some electronic surveillance mounted on the outside of the building. I’ll have to send Jack B. out there to scope the place out.

  Making the situation stranger was the fact that Vinnie had no idea what had taken place until one of the police officers walked over to him with gun drawn and asked him to ‘please exit the vehicle.’

  If I ever have grandchildren, someday when they’re old enough, I’ll tell them this story. Right now, it’s tough enough not to break up.

  After the story is told, Vinnie lets me know that the only way he wants to be around a dead body is if it’s in a hearse and at least three car lengths in front of his truck. I apologize to both he and Stuart. It’s a good thing that the police did the public a service by delivering Harold to Victor’s place, because there’s no way Vinnie was letting it back into the truck. I’m sure Victor will take care of further transportation when the autopsy has been done.

  Vinnie and Stuart finally calm down and I’ve come back to the boat, where I find Jack Bibberman is waiting for me. I can’t resist telling him about Olive’s adventure and we both spend several minutes having a good laugh about it. I also think there’s a giggle coming from the forward stateroom.

  The reason Jack came to the boat is to finish up the errand I sent him on – to pick up Harold’s personal belongings from County Jail. Harold probably knew he’d be arrested because there was nothing there but some articles of clothing and an envelope – addressed to me.

  His writing style is as brusque as his conversational skills. The letter is short and to the point, and answers some questions that were bothering me. It’s scribbled in pencil.

  Lawyer :

  Thanks for your help. I was in the gang too. If

  there’s any more reward money, send it to my wife

  and kids.

  So that’s what it was. He was part of the robbery gang. Now I know why he was so interested in whether or not there would be some extra reward money, but I still can’t figure out why he tried to kill Drago. He told me that it was ‘for the money,’ but who would pay him for a job like this? Our background information didn’t come up with any prior criminal record. I can understand how a previously honest person might get tempted to join a gang to rob banks. Ever since that crime was glamorized in the Warren Beatty film ‘Bonnie and Clyde,’ I’m sure a lot of unsuccessful people have fantasized about it, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it could lead to a cold-blooded murder for hire. There’s more to it that I don’t know about yet.

  Now that Harold’s murder trial is over, there’s no danger of little Suzi getting dragged in to testify, so I feel a little better about trying to find out if she actually saw anything in Drago’s room that day. Knocking on her stateroom door and asking her straight out is not my style with this kid, so I send an inter-office email addressed to any member of our staff who may have been in the hospital that day. I’m hoping this may get a slight rise out of her. If she takes the bait, I might even get some information out of her.

  As usual, she proves that she’s much smarter than I am. A message is delivered by dog-mail. It only asks one question. “What took you so long to recognize the tail?”

  She did it aga in. She’s so many steps ahead of me, I’m probably not even in the race any more. If she decides to practice law some day she’ll be dangerous in a courtroom. I’d hate to be on the other side of any case she’s on.

  To my amazement, the door to her stateroom opens and she actually comes out to speak to me.

  “Thank you for not getting me involved in the case. I really didn’t want to go against Myra. I didn’t see anything in the hospital that day. As I walked past the room, all I saw was that man hanging his coat up in the closet.”

  That having been said, she promptly turns around and they both exit. The Saint Bernard had no comment.

  Did I hear her right? She said that Harold was hanging up his coat in the hospital room closet. Something in my brain doesn’t compute. I must have watched that hospital footage more than fifty times, but I don’t remember seeing Harold in a coat. It’s back to the VCR. I get the videos out and start watching them again.

  After the pillow incident, Harold appears on the hallway camera wearing a trench coat. I go over the earlier tapes. He wasn’t wearing a coat when he came into the hospital room. She was partly correct. He went to the closet all right, but not to hang up his coat – to take Drago’s coat. But why? Why would he want to steal Drago’s coat?

  I call Jack Bibberman and tell him that his job is to find out the names of the paramedics who picked Drago up at the bank after his slip-and-fall. I want to interview them. Now I’ll take a look at the bank’s videos, to see what Drago was wearing that day.

  Sure enough, the bank’s cameras show Drago wearing that same trench coat. Nothing more to do now until Jack B. gets me those paramedics to talk to.

  The phone rings. It’s Stuart.

  “Yeah Stu, what’s up?”

  “Vinnie put in a workman’s comp claim

  against me .”

  “You must be kidding – why would he do a

  thing like that?”

  “Because I told him to. He was so upset about

  that incident with Harold and Olive, he hasn’t been

  sleeping very well and he’s really been acting edgy. I

  think the corpse thing really got to him, so I told him

  that if he puts in a claim the insurance company will

  pay for some therapy.”

  “Okay, I’ll go along with that. Is it helping

  any? Have you noticed any change in his behavior?” “Yeah, he’s calmed down a bit… and he got

  back together with Olive, so he’s a lot happier now.

  But he still won’t go to a funeral unless he’s driving

  the truck. He never did like them, you know. His

  uncle died last year and Vinnie wouldn’t even go to

  his funeral – he was afraid he’d see the guy in an

  open casket and he just wasn’t ready for that.” I never realized how much Vinnie disliked

  dead bodies. I can’t help but laugh every time I think

  about it, but I also feel bad he was traumatized like

  that. I guess if you’re a person who doesn’t care to be

  around stiffs, an experience like that can really shake

  you up. It’s nice to know that he sought out some

  professional help – it takes guts for someone to do

  that. Maybe it’ll stop him from peeing on trees, too.

  Jack B. comes through for me again. He got the names of the paramedics who brought Drago to the hospital. They both work out of a fire station not far from the Marina, so I go over there to ask them a few questions. When I ask them about Drago’s clothing, they tell me that they remember he was wearing a dark trench coat.

  “You guys must see almost a hundred people a month. How can you remember what a guy was wearing a couple of months ago?”

  “Simple Mister Sharp, other than Peter Falk playing Lieutenant Columbo, not too many people wear a trench coat on a warm day when the sun is shining.”

  They’re right. This trench coat is becoming more interesting every day. Just another question and I’m through. “Did you guys take him to the hospital with the trench coat on?”

  “No, we usually remo ve outer garments, so that we can loosen up shirts, ties, and belts. But I’ll tell you one thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The trench coat was heavy. When we took it off and tossed it into the back of our vehicle, it made a clunk when it landed.”

  “Did you check to see what made the noise?” They both answered
, almost in unison “No way. If he had a ton of coins or something on him from the bank, we didn’t want any part of it. Better to let the FBI go through his pockets… we don’t get paid to investigate, all we do is resuscitate.”

  I remember going through the police reports. They specifically mentioned that Drago didn’t have anything on him that indicated he was a bank customer. No deposit or withdrawal stuff, no nothing. If they found out what he didn’t have, why didn’t they find what he did have? Maybe it’s because they didn’t do their investigation until after Harold took the coat.

  The police report is somewhere in the file, so I hunt for it and drag it out. All they mention going through are his suit and pants pockets. No mention of a coat. Harold must have beat them to it.

  I call Victor at his autopsy lab. “Victor, let me ask you a question. Do you ever take fingerprints off of the bodies you examine?”

  “Sure, Mister Sharp. Any time it’s a case where the deceased was involved in a crime.”

  “Drago wasn’t involved in a crime. Did you happen to take his?”

  “Sure he was involved in a crime. At the time he was brought in here, everyone still thought that he was a murder victim. Nobody asked me to, but after working in crime labs for so long, I sort of do it out of force of habit. Let’s see… I’ve got the fingerprint card laying around here somewhere. Do you want it?”

  This is great news. I tell Victor to scan it into the computer and email it over here. I then call Lieutenant Evans in Van Nuys and tell him that I need a favor and if anything pans out from it, he’ll get the credit.

  He jumps at the chance to join in with Captain Crime Crusader. The fingerprint card is sent to him electronically and he runs it through the system for me.

  Two days later, I get a call from the lieutenant. ”Mister Sharp, we have something very interesting for you. Your guy Vlad has been a very bad boy.”

  “Did you say Vlad? My guy’s name isn’t Vlad… it’s Mike Drago.

  “That’s what you think. The fingerprints you sent me match up with a guy named Vlad Drago, who is wanted by Interpol for crimes of violence in several countries. He came here from Croatia and has a rap sheet a mile long. Do you want me to round him up for you?”