Judgment

by Lee Goldberg

  Macklin recognized him immediately: Primo Manriquez, leader of the Bounty Hunters gang.

  Esteban, his smile gone, slipped quietly into the darkness behind Primo. "Howdy, Officer." Primo's sneer grew into a sadistic smile as he approached Macklin. "How are you doin'?"

  Macklin swallowed, his mouth thick with the sour taste of blood. "You're making a big mistake," Macklin said quietly.

  "Really?" Primo laughed. "Shit, man, you are a mess. What you need is a bath."

  Primo nodded and Macklin was forced to his knees.

  Macklin, breathing hoarsely through his mouth, glared into Primo's gray eyes and strained against his captors.

  Primo smiled down at him. "Time to wash up." He brought a rusted gasoline can out from behind his back and tipped it over Macklin's head. Macklin felt the gasoline splashing over him, soaking his wound with a sharp, stinging pain that brought tears to his eyes. The heavy fumes churned his stomach. Macklin closed his eyes tightly, trying to choke back the rising bile and overcome the pain.

  "Pick him up," Primo said with disgust. Macklin was pulled to his feet and pushed back against the wall.

  Through the blur of gasoline and tears, Macklin saw Primo strike a match. The flame was sharp and cast a glow that flickered on the youth's face. "I'm gonna barbeque a pig."

  Primo met Macklin's gaze, searching for a trace of fear, and found none. It unnerved Primo, and Macklin knew it. A small, final victory.

  Macklin spit into Primo's face. "Fuck you, shorty."

  # # # # # #

  Bertrum Gruber sucked gently on the chalky antacid tablet as he leaned forward and cranked the steering wheel, twisting the groaning bus through the empty intersection.

  The bus smoked and coughed its way down the street while Bertrum thought about his favorite Honeymooners episodes. He was trying to take his mind off the Hoagie Steak sandwich that crouched in his stomach like a brick. The next time he took a shit he figured he'd have to bring along some dynamite to clear the pipe afterwards.

  Ralph Kramden, as immortalized by Jackie Gleason, was the only hero Bertrum could identify with. Bertrum had a nagging wife and a shithole apartment and drove a bus full of noisy punks and smelly winos just like hapless Ralph. He never missed an episode, rushing home for the two a.m. rerun on the UHF channel that never came in clearly. Under his driver's seat he kept a ninety-eight-page handwritten script for the ultimate Honeymooners episode. Should a Hollywood producer ever step on the bus, Bertrum planned to convince him that the world was waiting to see Ralph and Norton become folk singers. Bertrum had even written the songs.

  The acid bubbled in Bertrum's stomach as he wrestled the bus around the next corner. A light of flame burst out of an alley, screaming across his path like a crackling fuse. He knew his eyes were playing tricks on him again; it looked like a human being at the center of the flaming torch.

  Bertrum gasped, choking on the tablet and wrenching the wheel hard to the left. The back end fishtailed and swatted the burning body into a row of parked cars. The bus started to roll, hesitated on two wheels, and then slowly regained its equilibrium.

  Bertrum lay across his huge steering wheel, gurgling for air, the right side of his head pressed on the horn, filling the darkness with a wailing bellow.

  A speeding Camaro screeched within inches of the bus before Bertrum saw it veer away, plowing through the window of the Pistol Dawn. The customers fled as the car splintered the bar apart and smashed into the wall just under the TV set.

  An instant later he saw another car closing in on the bus. He closed his eyes.

  POW! ZOOM! To the moon, Alice!

  Bertrum was knocked to the floor by the impact. An explosion rocked the bus, lifting the tail end up like a teeter-totter.

  The customers stumbling out of the Pistol Dawn cowered against the searing heat of the flames that enveloped the bus. Arms of fire seemed to reach out to the adjoining buildings, wrapping around the structures and spiraling upwards. The customers scrambled down the street and could hear glass shattering like firecrackers in the inferno behind them.

  The flames were licking the night sky when the local precinct desk sergeant, eating from a bag of corn chips, got the first call. The woman wanted to report an earthquake.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Now, this is a fucking car.

  Long, sleek, and black, the body arced forward like a wave. The shiny front grillwork, sharp and mean, tapered back to a pair of sharp fins that sliced the air so bad you could swear it whined.

  Now, this is a fucking car.

  "What are you doing, Brett, waxing the car or making love to it? Shit, I can read your mind. It's written all over your face. 'What a car.' It's another dinosaur, that's what it is. I'll keep my Chevette, thanks."

  Brett straightened up and wiped his brow with the back of his hand. "It's more than a car, Mort. It's an experience."

  Mort groaned. "Wait, wait, I know the next golden words that are gonna come out of your mouth. 'You haven't driven a car until you've slid down the road in a fifty-nine Caddy.' Gimme a break, will you?"

  Brett grinned, damp with sweat in his UCLA jersey and dirty jeans. "You're a real asshole, you know that, Mort?" He bent over the trunk of the car, rubbing a rag across the black finish. "Turn on the set."

  Mort finished his Tab, crinkled the can, and shuffled across Brett's garage to the cluttered workbench, flicking on the black-and-white portable and tossing his can amidst the tools and auto parts.

  A great gray fuzzstorm filled the screen.

  "Smack it, Mort."

  Mort slapped the side of the set, kicking up dust, and Elias Simon filled the screen, heading full throttle towards the end of his evening sermon.

  "Simon says it's time to give some WORTHSHIP, to give to the Lord and show Him the VALUE of His work, to give the money that can keep this ministry and Jesus alive in our sin-ridden city."

  "I love this guy," Brett said."Best comedy on television." He caressed a Caddy fin with his rag.

  "So, lemme tell you about my date last night." Mort popped open another Tab and adjusted himself on three weeks' worth of the Los Angeles Times.

  "Shoot."

  ". . . Simon says give; Simon says HE must know the value of your faith . . ."

  "First I took her to McGinty's for a drink. Course, I had a club soda."

  "Yeah, I bet."

  Mort Suderson had been an LAPD copter pilot until one night, while blind drunk, he flew over downtown Los Angeles and dropped wine bottles full of piss on city hall, superior court, Mel's Meat Burgers, and a sleeping derelict.

  The derelict, who took a shower for the first time in seven years and needed thirty-seven stitches to patch up his wounds, filed a $3.2 million lawsuit against the city.

  Mort was promptly fired.

  Brett hired the boozing pilot, on the recommendation of Brett's friends in the department, and brought him to work as a mechanic at his Blue Yonder Airways hangar at the Santa Monica Airport. Once Mort dried out, Brett used him as a pilot on a limited basis.

  Although he was sober most of the time, Macklin suspected Mort still courted the bottle.

  "Hey, I don't get bad drunk, you know that." Mort swished the gulp of Tab between his cheeks like mouthwash and then swallowed it. "Only thing that happens to me when I'm drunk is that I think as fast as I talk."

  Brett glanced at the set. Simon, trim and crisp in his blue suit, his eyes sparkling, moved along the stage like a cat on a fence.

  The television audience applauded and Simon soaked it all in with a broad grin. "What are you saving your money for? Material things? A new Mercedes? These things won't bring you closer to HIM . . ."

  "She had blond hair and dark eyebrows," Mort said. "I couldn't help thinking what color her pubes were, ya know? It was a sick thought but I couldn't help it."

  ". . . use your money in a way that will make HIM proud. Come Judgment Day the Almighty doesn't want to see your Mercedes. He wants to know you helped His ministries, that you helped
bring JEEESSSSUUUUSSSSS to others."

  "Her boyfriend is a urologist. He's in Boston now. She's good people. She's interesting." Mort looked at Brett, who was rubbing down the driver's side of the car and shooting glances at the set. "Hey, are you listening to me?"

  "Yes, yes. She's good people. So, what happened?"

  "Nothing happened. We went to her place, she talked about her boyfriend, and I left. I'm seeing her again tonight."

  "Uh-huh."

  "I think she wants me, Brett."

  Brett groaned. "C'mon, Mort. It's always the same story. You always say they do and they don't."

  "No, I can feel it. I saw it in her eyes: I want you, Mort Suderson. It was right there." Mort finished his TAB and winced. "I just gotta get over this premature ejaculation thing. I don't mind it, but they always do."

  Brett grinned. "What's the workload like this week?"

  "Not too heavy. I'm flying some exec types to Fort Lauderdale in the morning, and some movie crew wants to take the chopper on a spin over the valley. The rest of the week looks pretty light. I dunno."

  "So we'll be spending some time in town, then?"

  "Yep."

  Brett straightened up and stretched. "Finished. How's she look, Mort? Beautiful?"

  "It's just an old Caddy. Just like the three others on the front lawn."

  "Maybe to you." He caressed the hood. "But this is a fuckin' car."

  The phone rang.

  "Gotta go, Brett." Mort waved and headed for the side door as Brett dashed inside the house to answer the phone.

  "Hello?"

  "Hi, it's me." It was Ronny Shaw, Brett's oldest and closest friend. They'd met in the first grade when Ronny, a quiet black boy with few friends, came to Brett's aid when he was attacked by three third graders after his lunch money. They later went to UCLA together, Brett on a track scholarship and Ronny on a minority fellowship. Brett graduated with a degree in aeronautical engineering, while Ronny, a philosophy major, drifted among nowhere jobs before becoming a police officer and eventually a homicide detective.

  "How's your Caddy running, Ron?" Macklin had given Shaw one of his completely restored classics, a '55.

  "Great. Are you ever going to sell one of those heaps or are you just going to keep giving them away to everyone you know?"

  Shaw's lightness seemed unnaturally forced.

  Brett's heartbeat inexplicably quickened. "I'm going to sell 'em, really, all of 'em except the Batmobile. I was just working on it when you called."

  "Listen, ah, I've got some bad news. Jesus, I wish I didn't have to tell you this."

  Score one for instinct. Brett Macklin's chest suddenly felt hard and tight.

  "What happened to Dad?"

  "He was killed, Mack."

  "How?"

  There was a silence.

  "How?"

  "Ah, Jesus. Listen, it looks like some kids . . . ah . . . set him on fire."

  Macklin winced, didn't know if he could breathe. Suddenly a wave of images, a high-speed slide show of his experiences with his father, flooded his thoughts. And then they disappeared. A deep, profound emptiness washed them away. He wanted to cry, he needed to cry, but anger held back his tears and made his head throb.

  "Where?" Macklin finally coughed. "Where and when did it happen?"

  "An hour ago in the neighborhood. There was . . . ah . . . also a bad accident with a bus. A bunch of people are hurt. Two others are dead."

  "You there now?"

  "Uh-huh."

  "I'm coming down."

  "Mack—"

  Macklin hung up. Elias Simon smiled. "Children of God, rejoice in His name!"

  # # # # # #

  Brett Macklin was flying.

  Somehow he hoped the freedom of flight would make the deep ache disappear, that he could soar above the hurt and anger and take refuge in the skies that had always soothed him in the past.

  This time he just couldn't soar high enough. There was no refuge. His father was dead, a lump of charred flesh smoldering on the pavement.

  He had seen what fire does to a body. If you fly long enough, you eventually see the aftermath of a crash. Macklin remembered the featureless black corpses and the acrid, stomach-wrenching odor.

  A cruel, twisted image tortured Macklin, his father's body, skinless and hairless, sizzling and crackling on the street among uncaring, smiling onlookers.

  Macklin brought the helicopter down in a clockwise arc towards South Central Los Angeles, towards the insignificant little patch of lights his father had devoted his life to for two decades.

  If Macklin had a bomb, he would have dropped it with no regrets. He would have reveled in the fireball consuming the neighborhood, scorching the land the way they had scorched his father's flesh.

  The press copters buzzed over the neighborhood like flies to a rotting corpse. Macklin dove in the path of one copter, causing the "Channel 7 News Spotter" to veer left suddenly, nearly dropping the cockpit cameraman into the night.

  Lighting the street was a fountain of flame. The fire roared amidst a pulsing circle of water. Macklin swooped low over the scene, arced sharply upwards and to the right, and then ped down over the street again through the laser-beam-like crisscross of flashing red lights.

  The ground below Macklin looked like a scene from a grade B war movie. World War II. London. The Luftwaffe had leveled streets into ash piles.

  Cinders glowed where buildings and life had been. This was no movie. But to Macklin, it was very much a war zone.

  Macklin landed the copter in a parking lot, forcing a throng of reporters, gawkers, and police away from his path. He jumped out of the copter and strode past the angered crowd, stepped over the police barricade, and moved towards the fire-engulfed bus.

  "Just who the fuck do you think you are?" A plainclothes cop grabbed Macklin by the shoulder and spun him around. Macklin punched the man in the mouth, sending him sprawling, and continued walking.

  "Hold it, fucker, or I'll blow your goddamned head off!"

  Macklin stopped. He turned around slowly.

  Behind Macklin, legs spread and gun pointed at him, stood a mustached man in a beige polyester knit suit. The man's lips were thin, so tight and narrow you couldn't shove a Nabisco vanilla wafer through them, and drawn into a satisfied smile.

  The man stormed up to Macklin and pointed the gun right in his face. Macklin was motionless, eyeing the man with cool reserve. "Do you want to get out of my way," Macklin whispered, "or do I have to walk over you?"

  "So you're a comedian." He stepped aside, lowering his gun. "Sure I'll move. Excuse me. My mistake."

  As Macklin passed him, the man raised the gun like a club and brought it down towards Macklin's head. Macklin caught the motion out of the corner of his eye, sidestepped the blow, grabbed the man's wrist, and pinned his arm behind his back. The gun clattered to the ground.

  "Let him go, Mack." Macklin felt a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "Let him go."

  Macklin released the man with a push, nearly knocking him down.

  "Jesus, Mack." Shaw sighed.

  The man picked up his gun and pulled a pair of handcuffs from inside his pocket. "You're under arrest, hotshot."

  "Relax, Sliran. No one's getting arrested." Shaw stared at his flustered partner on the homicide detail. "Put the cuffs away. This is JD Macklin's son, Brett. He's a little agitated."

  "A little agitated," Sliran said. "Jesus fucking Christ, Shaw, your agitated friend came real close to sharing a slab with his daddy tonight. Tell your agitated friend that next time he'd better pray you're around to save his neck."

  The cop adjusted his glasses, holstered his gun, and walked away. "I'm sorry, Ron," Macklin said tonelessly. "Fill me in."

  Shaw put his arm around Macklin and led him towards the flames. "It looks like your father was walking his beat and was crossing that alley over there when some kids . . . ah . . . must've jumped him and dumped gasoline on him."

  Shaw and Macklin stopped just beside the
firemen, who had nearly succeeded in drowning the flames.

  "How did this happen?"

  Shaw looked into Macklin's eyes. All he saw there were the flames. "Ah, your dad ran into the street. The bus tried to avoid him, and, well, there was an accident."

  An ambulance screeched away from a nearby curb and screamed down the street. From within a huddle of men surrounding a row of cars, a black body bag was carried by two officers and hefted into the back of the coroner's wagon.

  "What have you got?" Macklin said, barely audible.

  "A few leads. We'll have more tomorrow." Shaw tightened his grip on Macklin's shoulder. "Mack, there's nothing more you can do here. Go home."

  Macklin sighed. "I want the people who did this Ron."

  "Mack, I'll get 'em. I promise. Now, go home, please."

  The headlights of the coroner's wagon flashed in Macklin's eyes, momentarily blinding him. "I want a call tomorrow."

  Shaw nodded as Macklin turned and headed back to the copter, its blades still spinning.

  "Goddamn it!" Shaw growled, looking into the bus's smoking, gutted hold and then at the receding lights of the coroner's wagon as it took away the best cop he ever knew. "I hate this fucking job."

  CHAPTER TWO

  ". . . James Douglas Macklin was a humanitarian, devoting his life to the protection and care of others. He was more than just a police officer doing his job. JD was a trusted friend to the people he dealt with on the streets and among those he worked with on the force. Officer Macklin was a role model for all young officers to aspire to, a man who . . ."

  Brett Macklin, his arm around his daughter's shoulders, wasn't listening to LAPD Chief Jed Stocker's praise-laden eulogy. It was an empty charade for the press and made Macklin feel nauseous. Stocker had hated JD Macklin.

  Stocker and JD had gone to the academy together, and while Stocker desk-hopped to the top, JD preferred to remain on the streets. Although technically JD was a peon, he freely (and frequently) criticized Stocker to his face. To JD, Stocker wasn't a policeman but a glorified publicist, an armchair general who had no idea what the urban battleground was like. To Stocker, JD was an obnoxious, disrespectful, old-fashioned, simpleminded, big-mouthed pain in the ass.