Send Out The Clowns (Frank River Series)

by Harry Hoge

  "Been waiting long?" she asked. He shook his head and opened the door for her. She walked through the big open room, past the deli cases and the long serving area with the cafeteria-like rail for pushing trays, to a small table for two near the back, close to the coffee pots and delicious smelling baskets of free fresh bread. Bread. Soul food. She shut her eyes and gritted her teeth.

  The room was empty and they chose a table for two by the wall. Frank stayed to watch Gerry's bag while she grazed through the serving line. Like a robot in a trance, he filled two glasses with water, ice and a lemon slice each and grabbed a pile of napkins. When she returned with a bowl of soup on a tray and a wooden block with the letter "B" carved in the side, he went to the front. Gerry watched him inch past the case filled with pastries, inhaling the sweet smell of cheesecake, peach turnovers and other exotic desserts. She had done the same, resisting temptation for the sake of maintaining her weight. He ordered a turkey and cheese sandwich and received his own wooden block, and then, after deciding on a bowl of onion soup, he set a cup and saucer on the tray and paid the girl behind the register.

  "Got your coffee yet?" he asked as he put the soup and the wooden block on the table. Gerry nodded. By the time he returned with his cup filled, both his sandwich and her salad had arrived. The wooden blocks were gone. They each tried a bite or two of the lunch.

  "What's this new idea about these not being serial killings?" Frank asked. He chewed on the bite of sandwich, touching a napkin to his mouth as he swallowed.

  "Even though there's a ritualistic method going on here, there are too many variables. It's more like the killer wants YOU to believe it's serial. I think it's directed at you." That brought a raised eyebrow.

  "Why's that?"

  Gerry placed her elbows on the table and leaned over. "First of all, this is my first homicide case. No one even knows me downtown. I've been working out in Kingwood, remember? Second reason is the care the perp takes to sanitize the scene. I can almost feel the killer trying to think like you do, and stay one step ahead. Then third, this last one had the juggler's clue. As if to say, you've got too many balls in the air, Detective."

  "You mean as if he knows me like a book and is trying to outsmart me?"

  "Right. Laughing at you."

  Frank hesitated. Sipped at his coffee. "That points back to Rankin. I told you about the files he had on my career. He knows more about me than I know about myself." Frank squinted. "I tried to get a search warrant, but Sumbitch wouldn't sign it. Not enough evidence. She's right."

  Gerry leaned back and picked at her salad. "I'm not so sure it's Rankin."

  "Why's that?"

  "You told me there's no way he can get out of his chair without help, that his legs are atrophied. Both of these murders took place on upper floors where the handicap ramps would make it difficult to come and go without being seen, and no man in a wheelchair was seen at either place."

  "Maybe that goon, Gus, helped him?"

  "Same problem. It's even harder for two men, one in a chair, to avoid being seen."

  Frank sighed. "Yeah, I know. I've thought about that a lot and don't have an answer." He shoved chips into his mouth and drank some water before taking the last bite of his sandwich.

  "What did you learn from the lab report?" Gerry asked.

  "Nothing we didn't already know. Aquilla has matched the blood type from the motel drain with Laurie Lowe. She said she would run DNA to tie it. Al Shuman is almost certain Lowe was poisoned like the first victim, but hasn't confirmed anything yet. What did you find out?"

  "After we finished at the motel, I went back to the office and spent time on the computer." She took out her notes. "Laurie Lowe doesn't seem to have any family. Grew up in a home for abandoned children in Albuquerque. Moved around a lot since leaving home, trying various ways to get into show business and has been pretty much a bust at them all. Her address in Albuquerque has been her base for the last two years. Even her web page isn't memorable. There's nothing I've found in her past to connect her with Rankin, or Nguyen, or anyone else at either comedy club. Aquilla said the autopsy showed she had a rough childhood. Evidence of overwork at a young age, and multiple broken bones as though she'd been beaten."

  An older woman came into the room. A tote bag hung on her arm like a purse. On the side of the bag, a decal of the Tasmanian Devil stuck his tongue out at the detectives. They put their conversation on hold as the woman filled a glass with ice and water and piled several pieces of free bread, butter and jam on a plate. She took a seat by the window in the same room and pulled a book from the tote bag. Frank and Gerry stood and carried fresh coffee out to the patio and a wrought-iron table with two chairs.

  It was warm in the sun, a beautiful early November day in Houston. They both scanned the patio. Only one other table was occupied. A man and a young girl sat drinking tea and talking in low tones. Gerry decided they couldn't overhear what she and Frank were discussing unless they tried hard, and they showed no indication of wanting to.

  "This dead girl is getting to me, Frank. I keep having a fantasy that I cap the killer and watch him die a slow death on the street."

  Before Frank could answer, a grackle lit on the table. A female. Brown, flashing iridescent in the sun. The bird cocked its head and gave Frank thorough scrutiny with a bold, yellow eye. A quick glance around the table convinced the scavenger there was no profit in remaining, so it hopped to the floor and wobbled around, pecking at invisible crumbs.

  Frank brought his gaze to Gerry, and held her eyes with a serious look. "I know how you feel. In almost every case, I reach a point where I hope the killer and I will meet in a dark alley. The way I overcome my rage is to think about how their life will be up in Huntsville."

  Gerry didn't answer, merely held Frank's look.

  Frank glanced away, then lifted his head and watched the traffic along Kirby.

  "Prison is not a nice place," he explained, more to the traffic than to Gerry. "Regardless what the general public thinks about the inmates being pandered to by the current system. I don't think I'm even in favor of the death sentence anymore, other than the fact that living conditions may be worse on death row than in the general population. It may take ten or twelve years before the death sentence clears the appeal hurdles and is carried out and someone shoves a needle in a killer's arm, but think about those years, twenty-three hours a day in a solitary cell, an hour for exercise, guards monitoring your every move. Nothing to do but think, and smell yourself decaying in your cell. If you die, you're through with it, but living every day with your own twisted mind or wandering around the steel halls wondering if and when somebody's going to push a shank through your ribs, or worse, is the real cruel and unusual." He looked back at Gerry. "So if I blow the scum away, he gets off light." He smiled. "Keep that in mind. It may help."

  "You're a good man, Detective Rivers."

  Frank blushed and squirmed in his seat. "Don't make me out to be a hero, Gerry. There are lots of things in my past I'm not proud of."

  "Like what, Frank? You rat out a friend in high school or something?"

  He looked her square in the eye. "For one instance, when I was old enough to know better, I stood by and watched a gang of my friends rough up another boy just because he was black. Seemed like the right thing to do at the time."

  Gerry laid her hand on Frank's arm and leaned over the table so she would be as close to him as she could. "You're no racist, Frank. Believe me. I know about those things." She sat back and grinned. "Besides, when I was growing up, I helped the boys in the 'hood show more than one 'Taco Tom' who was runnin' the show."

  Gerry's cell phone rang. She answered it as Frank cleaned their trash from the table. When she finished the conversation, she looked at Frank. "That was Al Shuman. Laurie Lowe died from an overdose of mescaline. He thinks it came from peyote. He also said that Lowe had evidence of long time use of drugs. It isn't likely that she did herself, but then, we knew that."

  They left the restau
rant together. Frank's car was parked to the left, north of University Boulevard. They stopped to discuss their next move.

  "I think I'll take a quick trip to Huntsville. I've been putting off going to see Skip. Maybe it's time. He was an undercover narc before he transferred to homicide, and I remember him talking about how much time he spent working in the Westheimer area. Maybe he knows some information on Rankin," Frank commented. "How about you? Probably ought to see what you can find out about peyote."

  "Fine. I'll call you about five."

  Frank walked to his squad car and climbed in. Gerry crossed University Boulevard and got into her car. She plunged the key into the ignition, but sat with her hand in suspended animation before turning the engine on, thinking about how the case had taken a turn for her. Peyote. This was in her area of expertise. Peyote wasn't classified as a poison, but a narcotic. Mescaline had common use. She had dealt with a case of death by overdose of mescaline while in Kingwood. She started the car and eased into traffic. When she turned right on Kirby, the delay had put several cars between her and Frank. She could barely make out the light rack on the squad car's roof. She watched as he moved to the right lane and drove up the entry ramp, going northeast on the Southwest Freeway.

  She continued north under the freeway and turned left onto the entry ramp. Two exits later she left the freeway and followed the service road past Hillcroft to South Fondren. She turned south, passed under the freeway and headed back to the east along the service road, cruising slowly in the right lane until she found the familiar convenience store she was looking for. She parked the cruiser on the long, narrow blacktop apron near the cyclone fence that was grown over with mulberry trees and trumpet vine.

  The man behind the counter in the store was Asian. Gerry had always assumed he was Indian because of his sing-song gentle voice. The man was short and slender, with a silky mustache and hair. He wore khaki pants and a long-waisted white shirt, not tucked in. A plastic name tag on his shirt read "Hello - My Name is Mac." She was certain his name wasn't really Mac, but everyone had called him that since she could remember.

  "Hi, Mac," Gerry smiled as she approached the counter. "Is he home?"

  "Ah Missy Gardner, welcome. Yes, he is having his noon break. It is warming to see you again."

  "You like having cops visit your establishment?"

  "Ah, yes. That marked car lets the hooligans know I am a legitimate business man."

  Gerry smiled at Mac's use of the word 'hooligan.' It was a word seldom heard of late. "What's he smoking these days?" She asked.

  "Liggett, one-hundreds, full flavor," Mac said with a smile.

  Gerry gathered a handful of Hershey bars from a display on the counter. "Let me have a carton and these." She laid the chocolate on the counter.

  Mac turned and withdrew a carton of cigarettes from a storage bin behind him, laid it beside the candy and rang up the sale. "Twenty-eight dollars, for you a special price." He grinned. She scooped the merchandise and waved as she went outside. She strolled along the fence until she came to a place where a long weathered board ran the length of the support pipe. She banged on the board and waited. Almost immediately she heard a familiar voice.

  "Why, this is my lucky day." The fence sagged, exposing a doorway to a room-like area hidden in the vegetation. "Gigi, you come on in here. It's been a spell."

  "Hi, Smoky," Gerry smiled as she ducked to clear the vines and branches. "How you been."

  The man she called 'Smoky' fastened the fence and pulled her into a fatherly hug. Gerry didn't know how old Smoky might be. She'd known him all her life and had often tried to calculate how many years he'd been roaming southwest Houston, selling day-old newspapers. He had been her grandmother's friend and suitor. She figured he had to be at least ninety. He wore a baggy, olive-drab jump suit, a black quilted jacket and an Astro’s’ ball cap. He'd been known as 'Bones' most of his life because of his tall, slender build, which looked almost skeletal. About twenty years earlier, his skin had taken on a dryness that made it look more gray than mahogany, hence the addition of 'Smoky.' Smoky Bones—a legend in this part of town.

  "You still making your living selling day-old newspapers to the passers by?"

  He chuckled. "I'll sell any newspaper I can find as long as they're free from food stains and roach shit. Make a good livin.' Got a regular clientele. I always say I need fifty cents, but most of my customers give me a dollar, or sometimes two. It's a way of beggin' that allows me to keep my head up. I sold out already today, so I'm havin' a nooner." He gestured toward an area where the vegetation was worn away and the dirt packed hard. A ratty lawn chair sat beside a dirty, blue plastic cooler and a fire pit surrounded by cobbles. The fire wasn't burning. Across from the chair was a black plastic milk crate stood on end. "Come join me. I had a good day."

  Gerry sat on the milk crate and pretended to warm her hands over the dead fire.

  Smoky reached into the cooler and withdrew two frosty cans of Coors Light. He popped the tops and handed one to her. "Really had a good day. Usually I drink Keystone, but I decided to treat myself." He held out the can and Gerry touched her can to his as a toast. Smoky took a drink, then nodded to the cigarettes and candy bars in the plastic sack by Gerry's feet.

  That for me?"

  "Only if you got information for me. Like always." She handed the sack across to him and he settled into the lawn chair.

  "How's your sweet dear grandmamma?" he asked, as he unwrapped a Hershey and took half of it in his mouth.

  Gerry had told him several times her grandmother had died, but he refused to accept the fact. As a young man he had seriously courted the woman. In those days he cut quite a figure, usually with money in his pocket from working as a framer for a construction company that built half the structures in the Sharpstown area. Now he was content to live in his urban wilderness cave and hustle second-hand newspapers for whatever he could get. He never complained, claiming he had a life style that many of his friends envied. Gerry waited for him to bring the conversation around to what they both knew was the reason for her visit.

  "You still doggin' them junkies up to Kingwood?" he asked. Gerry knew Smoky would drink more than a six-pack of beer a day and chain smoke whenever he could afford cigarettes, but he thought of narcotics as the worst thing a person could do, and would help her run pushers to earth whenever he could. "Them bloodsuckers ruin many a good man, yesiree."

  "I'm not in Kingwood anymore, Smoky. I got transferred downtown. I'm working homicide now."

  He chuckled and shook his head. "I always knowed you'd make the big time. Homicide detective, eh. Do you like the work?"

  "So far. I'm on my first case."

  "Well, we got to make it your best case." He leaned forward and placed his elbows on his knees, looking into her eyes with a soft, fatherly expression. "What can I help you with?"

  "Have you heard of some strange dope on the street lately?"

  "What you mean, strange?"

  "Unusual stuff, not snow or crystal, mescaline maybe."

  He sat back and slapped his thigh. "Coyote peyote. Yes sir. I hear it's about. Other stuff too, all funny soundin' stuff from tropical countries, but it ain't part of the main flow. Them regular dealers is hot about it too. They want in on it or it's gotta go." His face turned grim. "Dangerous situation, Gigi. Surely is."

  "You know who's dealing it?"

  Smoky looked thoughtful. He stood and shoved his empty beer can into a black trash bag. He pulled a fresh one from the cooler and looked over at her, tacitly asking whether she wanted another. She shook her can, and then shook her head. He popped the top and settled back in his chair. "Don't rightly know. Folks around say it's a white woman up town. They call her the Shuman Lily, something like that."

  "Shaman?"

  "That's the word. What's it mean?"

  "Sorta like an Indian medicine man."

  "That right? Umm? Well she got a network and it's QT. Not even the pushers know who she be. But I figure somebody
's gotta know. How else she gonna get the stuff on the street?"

  They talked their way through the rest of the six pack; one more for Gerry, the rest Smoky took care of. She kissed him on the cheek, and waved to Mac as she climbed into the patrol car.

  She entered the Southwest Freeway at the next possible ramp and drove to the 610 loop, turned north and moved with traffic toward headquarters.

  When she arrived at the department, she hurried inside to her computer workstation. She reopened a search for similar crimes, but instead of searching for 'Death by Poison' she keyed in the words, 'Overdose, Mescaline.' She got more than twenty thousand hits. She refined the search to exclude Native Americans and New Age connections, reducing the list to a manageable number. She printed the list and read the details of each case, marking through those that didn't seem remotely related to Laurie Lowe with a broad tipped, black felt pen, and highlighting those of interest in yellow.

  When she was satisfied with her product, she reprinted the six highlighted case numbers and read the details through several times. There really seemed to be a pattern. Time to talk to Frank. She tried the cell phone. Out of the area. She didn't think she wanted to put any information out on the radio, and decided to wait to fill Frank in when he returned from Huntsville that evening. Right now, she needed to talk to Sumbitch.

  Chapter 13

  Frank cruised along in the right lane waiting for Gerry to catch up. When she didn't show, he shrugged and accelerated. He considered swinging east then heading north on the Hardy Toll Road, but traffic was light and he opted for Interstate 45 the more direct route. He stayed in the left lane with the fastest traffic after passing the exit to MO and the route to San Antonio It had been a while since he'd driven north out of town. The familiar landscape brought back memories of his early days on the force, particularly the bombing of that professor's house in Wildewood and the tragedy that had resulted, sending his partner to prison. The outlet mall on his left reminded him of when the area had been a drive-in movie, and then a field where the Goodyear blimp had been housed for several years. The city was ever changing. Many of the buildings evacuated and left abandoned, for years sometimes, had been revived like fresh flowers in the spring, but not always. There were still neglected ruins from derelict developments that presented people entering Houston from the north a false impression of the town. The development of the Woodlands Mall had rejuvenated that entire area; the interstate was wider and businesses boomed for several miles on either side of the freeway.