The Red Dahlia

by Lynda La Plante

  Langton and Lewis looked tired out. They had spent hours at the clubs with little result. Louise was remembered by two waiters at Stringfellow’s, but so far as they could recall, she was always with a different man. They could not, from the vague description, identify any specific tall, dark stranger who had been with her. Her male friends were often young rock singers who she picked up in the club. The last night she was there had been a big show-biz occasion, with many glitzy guests who had been to a film premiere. They had roped off private sections and the place was jumping. The doormen and bouncers were no help; it seemed Louise came and went without a trace.

  Barolli had not fared any better; a few people recalled seeing Louise, but not recently. He had tramped from one rather seedy nightclub to the next, showing her photograph. They had all recognized her; some knew she was dead, others didn’t. She was often alone, and would chat to the barmen about waiting for a modeling agent to contact her. It appeared she never drank too much and was always polite and friendly; if she was on the game, it was not obvious. Not one person questioned remembered seeing her with an older man; the clubs were mainly for people her age. She was known, but not known; they all thought of her as being a very attractive girl but something about her was not quite right. One barman said it was as if she was always waiting for someone, often looking to the club’s entrance expectantly.

  Langton had asked for the cashmere sweaters they had taken from Louise’s flat to be traced. They were part of a large special deal for Harrods’s January sale the previous year, but none of the assistants could recall any tall, dark stranger buying one, either with cash or a credit card. The perfume, although costly, could have been sold to any one of hundreds of customers in a range of department stores. The search for Louise’s maroon coat also drew a blank. Sharon had made an attempt at describing Louise’s handbag, but “large black leather with a wide strap” was not much use. She also said that Louise sometimes used smaller clutch bags, but could not describe any in much detail. A search of the area where the body was found also yielded nothing. They were back almost to square one.

  DAY NINE

  Anna placed a call to the crime desk at both the Mirror and the Sun. She then went into the ladies’ to refresh her makeup. Running a comb through her hair, she stared at her reflection and took a deep breath. Langton might laugh her out of his office, but then again, he might not.

  “Well, this is another fucking fruitless day,” he muttered as she tapped and entered his office.

  “I wanted to have a quick chat.”

  “I’m all ears.” He wasn’t; he was doodling on a notepad, his face set in anger.

  “I just want to run something by you,” she said.

  He sighed impatiently. “Well, bloody get on with it.”

  She put the book on his desk. “It’s about the Black Dahlia murder.”

  Langton swore, fed up with the constant references to a girl just because she had a flower in her hair, but Anna continued. “Elizabeth Short was murdered in 1947 in the United States; her killer was never caught. This book is written by a former police officer who believes that his father was the man who killed her.”

  Langton stopped doodling and stared at the cover of the book.

  “If you flick through to the middle part, I’ve put a yellow sticker on the relevant pages. There are also mortuary photographs you should look at.”

  He sniffed and began turning over the pages. “What am I looking at?”

  “The body: look how she was found.”

  Langton frowned, turning the book this way and that to look at the black-and-white photographs. “Jesus Christ.”

  “There’s a website.”

  “What?”

  “There’s a website; it contains more detailed photographs of the way the victim was discovered.”

  “Holy shit. I don’t believe this.”

  “I read it last night and I couldn’t believe it either. If you look at the pages marked with blue stickers, they are also relevant, I think.”

  Langton sat back and began reading. He read in silence for about ten minutes, then he slowly lowered the book.

  “So what are you suggesting? That the same guy killed Louise? He’d have to be in his nineties, for God’s sake!”

  “No, no: the police officer’s father has been dead more than five years. Another possible suspect died in a fire in the sixties. Look at the next set of stickers.”

  “What color?” He looked up and gave her that smile.

  “Green. The man they hunted for Elizabeth’s murder was never traced; he is described as a ‘tall, dark stranger.’ There are also some sketches of him.”

  “Fuck me!” Langton said, then snapped the book closed. “So?”

  “So, I think we might have a copycat killer. I called both the Mirror and the Sun and spoke to their crime reporters. The Sun described Louise as the Red Dahlia. We thought it was just due to the flowers in the two victims’ hair. But they were both contacted.”

  Langton leaned forward. “And?”

  “In both cases they received an anonymous letter; neither thought anything of it, you know, possible crank, murder aficionado…”

  “Yeah, yeah, and?”

  “They destroyed them.”

  “Fuck!”

  “But look at the yellow stickers again. The LA killer sent many letters to the police and the newspapers, always gloating about how clever he was and that they’d never catch him…”

  “I’m reading, I’m reading!” Langton snapped.

  Anna waited until he had finished.

  “The anonymous note to the journalist at the Mirror, as far as he could remember, said something about Louise’s mouth being slit in two. The one sent to the other journalist, Richard Reynolds at the Sun, mentioned the Black Dahlia case and called Louise the Red Dahlia. Until then, Reynolds had never even heard of the murder of Elizabeth Short.”

  Langton flicked back and forward over the relevant photographs in the book.

  Anna continued. “The first note was sent to the Mirror journalist after his article had been published.”

  Langton sprang to his feet and shoved his hands into his pockets. “This is bloody good, Travis, bloody sick…but it’s possible. Jesus Christ, can you leave this with me for a while and I’ll chew it over? Don’t mention it to anyone. Not yet.”

  Anna nodded and walked out. Langton didn’t come into the incident room until two hours later. He bent down to place the book on Anna’s desk. He was so close she could smell his after-shave.

  “Can you get the website up for me?”

  “Sure.”

  He stared at the grotesque images of the dismembered Elizabeth and then said, very quietly, “Sick bastard, he even placed our body ten inches off the center. It’s bloody identical. My God, explain this one, huh?”

  “Copycat,” Anna said without emotion.

  Langton ran his fingers through his hair so that it stood up on end. “You think when this book was published it triggered…?” He used his hand to make a winding motion at the side of his head.

  “Who knows? Something had to.”

  Langton nodded, then patted her shoulder. “Get over to the offices at the Mirror and the Sun, see what they tossed; meanwhile I’ll bring this up with the team.”

  “Okay,” she said, shutting down the computer, adding, “It’s a very popular website.”

  “What does that say to you, Anna?”

  She shrugged and again he leaned close to her.

  “It says, Anna, that there’s a lot of sick fuckers out there, that’s what it says to me. Who the hell wants to see those mortuary photographs? It should be wiped off the web.”

  “We have to find him,” she murmured.

  “You think I don’t know that!” he snapped.

  “It’s just that if he is a copycat murderer, there were two others: the police at the time reckoned they were done by the same killer. If he’s copycatted Elizabeth Short, then what may happen is he’ll go the wh
ole nine yards and kill again.”

  Langton stuffed his hands into his trouser pockets. “I hope to Christ you’re wrong.”

  He moved off and she was left feeling slightly depressed, not because he hadn’t at any point praised her good work; it was his closeness. She had wanted some personal response from him, but had received none. It was as if their relationship from the last case had never existed. She mentally shook herself and told herself to get it together; after all, it had been she who had not wanted to continue seeing him. The truth was, there had been no one she had even been remotely interested in since Langton, and she chided herself for letting her old emotions seep back to the surface.

  Langton stood in front of the team, holding up the Black Dahlia book. Anna was well on her way to the Mirror’s offices by the time he mentioned that DI Travis had brought it to his attention.

  “We have a very sick development,” he said.

  He showed the mortuary photographs of Elizabeth Short to the team.

  “This victim was killed in Los Angeles nearly sixty years ago, but pass the book around and look at the way her body had been dismembered. Pay close attention to the mortuary photographs: you will see they are virtually identical to the way we found Louise Pennel. In fact, the entire scenario is crossing over. Their main suspect was described as a tall man, thirty-five to forty-five years old, well dressed and dark-haired. Their suspect was known to have been driving a very expensive automobile!”

  Langton pointed to the incident board: under WANTED FOR ELIMINATION was their prime suspect. He had been described by Sharon and the dental nurse as tall, dark-haired, and wearing an expensive draped coat. Neither woman was able to give the exact make of the car, but they described it as large and black, possibly a BMW or a Rover.

  Langton looked into the dregs of his coffee, drained the cup, and placed it down. He watched as the officers passed the book around, glancing at his watch. Intermittent gasps punctuated the silence in the room. One detective after another saw the horror they were now investigating mirrored in the black-and-white pictures of the murder that had occurred nearly sixty years ago.

  Langton continued. “There were two further murders; both were suspected to be by the same killer. If we are to consider, which I think we have to, that there is some sicko out there emulating this Black Dahlia killer, then it is also possible that he may have already targeted his second victim. Let’s hope to Christ we catch this bastard before he gets the opportunity for his next kill.”

  A murmur erupted from the stunned team as Langton walked over to the coffee machine for a fresh cup. He turned back to the room as Lewis pinned up the old black-and-white picture of Elizabeth Short on the incident board.

  “The press have already compared the two victims, more or less due to the fact Louise Pennel had a flower in her hair on the photograph they used; they have not, as yet, discovered that the brutality of these murders is almost identical. I am going to ask for a complete press embargo on any further comparisons between the two cases. I don’t want what was done to Elizabeth Short sparking a media frenzy of headlines. By withholding some of the details about the atrocities Louise suffered, we will be able to distinguish between the crackpot calls and a real tip-off, and it’s a tip-off I am desperate for.”

  Langton’s mobile rang and he headed into his office to take the call in private. It was Anna, who was sitting in the canteen at the Mirror’s offices. She had taken a statement from the journalist who had published the first photograph of Louise.

  “The journalist that received the typed note reckoned it was on schoolbook lined paper; the left-hand side was ripped.” She looked at her notebook and read the lines she had copied. “Roses are red, violets are blue, who killed Louise and slit her mouth in two?”

  “Shit!”

  “It had to have come from the killer, because we hadn’t given a full press release on the cuts to her mouth. I called Sharon and asked her if she had mentioned the wounds to the journalist and she said she hadn’t. Now for the twist: she also denies ever sending or being paid for the photograph.”

  “Could she be lying?”

  “I’m not sure; question is if she didn’t get paid for the photograph, who did?”

  “Where did it come from?”

  “He said he paid a runner for it; you know, they have contacts who hang out, taking photographs at clubs. Sometimes they get lucky.”

  “Did you get a name?”

  “Yep, Kenneth Dunn; I’m tracking him down.”

  “Good, okay; keep in touch.”

  Anna had arranged to meet Kenneth Dunn at a Radio Shack where he worked part-time. Dunn was very eager to speak to her and broke off a conversation he was having as Anna showed him her ID. He led her through to the back of the shop into a small storage area. Anna showed him the newspaper.

  “Did you sell this picture to the Mirror?”

  “Yes, they’ve already paid me for it.”

  “How did you come by this photograph?”

  “I can’t divulge my sources.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I have to pay them, and we do a trade-off.”

  “You didn’t take this photograph, correct?”

  “That’s right.”

  “So please tell me who gave it to you, or who you paid for it, or I will have you arrested for obstructing the police.”

  “What?”

  “It is imperative I know where this photograph came from and how it was passed to you, Mr. Dunn. This girl was murdered and it could become a vital piece of evidence; so, where did you get this photograph from?”

  He sighed. “I was given it.”

  “Who by?”

  “Look, I don’t want to get her into trouble; it wasn’t her idea for me to sell it: it was mine. I make a few quid at weekends hanging out at clubs; you know, snapping the stars as they go in or out—especially out, they love shots of them boozed up and falling down—and their own photographers get bored hanging around. I mean, some nights, I’ve been there until four in the morning.”

  “Who gave you this photograph, Mr. Dunn?”

  Again he hesitated, his greasy face shining; his dark hair was smothered in a gluelike gel that made it stick up in spikes.

  “Was it Sharon Bilkin?”

  Anna returned to her car and bleeped it open. She threw in her briefcase as she dialed Langton’s mobile.

  “She was lying: he got the picture from Sharon Bilkin on the promise he would try and get her some coverage, which he did, as she was featured in the same article. He didn’t take the photograph and he also didn’t know anything about the marks to our victim’s mouth.”

  Langton gave a long sigh, then there was silence.

  “Are you still there?” Anna asked.

  “Yeah, yeah, just trying to get the time frame organized in my brain. The journalist is sent the photo, or it’s passed to him by this Dunn character, who got it from Sharon, right?”

  “Yes, that’s what he said.”

  “They buy it, release pictures; so when did this note ‘roses are red, violets are blue’ shit come in?”

  “Day the article appeared.”

  “Go back to that silly little cow Sharon. She lied about this; see if she is lying about anything else.”

  Anna was almost out of breath by the time she reached the top of the stairs. Either it really was a long way up or she was getting out of shape.

  “It’s open,” came Sharon’s singsong voice.

  Anna found Sharon in the kitchen, wearing yellow marigolds.

  “I couldn’t face the dirty dishes anymore, so I been doing the housework.”

  Anna smiled; the kitchen did look a lot cleaner.

  “We need to talk, Sharon.”

  “Whatever. They come yesterday and took all her bedding and things from her wardrobe.”

  Sharon pointed to the cards left on the table by the forensic team, pinned to a neatly written list of all the items removed. “I said they could take whatever t
hey wanted; I mean, I don’t want her stuff and I don’t really know what to do with it. And with no rent from her, I’ve got to find someone else.”

  “Ah, so that’s the reason for the house cleaning,” Anna said.

  “Yeah, well, want the place to look nice, and no way am I going to say to a prospective tenant that the previous girl that shared with me was murdered. So, I don’t want her stuff. They took a lot, even her dirty laundry, but there’s still drawersful, and that old suitcase.”

  “Is there no one she knew that would want her things?”

  “I don’t know anyone.”

  “But you still have her photographs?”

  Sharon blushed and began to wash down the draining board.

  “Sharon, you said that you did not give that photograph to the press. It’s very important, because if you did…”

  “I didn’t sell it,” she said, rinsing the cloth.

  “But you did give it to Kenneth Dunn. Sharon, please stop wasting my time.”

  Sharon folded the dishcloth and hung it on the cooker rail, refusing to look at Anna.

  “Sharon, this is very important. It may not seem as if you are withholding evidence, but I need to know exactly what happened.”

  Sharon sat down. “All right, I know him. He’s done some snaps of me: a couple for a magazine called Buzz. He works up in Kilburn at a Radio Shack part-time until he gets his career as a photographer off the ground. I just bumped into him by accident: I didn’t arrange it; it was just a coincidence. We got talking and I told him about Louise, you know, what had happened to her, and we came back here for a coffee. I showed him some photographs and…I didn’t think it would matter.”