The Richard Deming Mystery Megapack

by Richard Deming

  The dead youth had been named Felipe Lopez. The one whose machete had killed him was Jesus Flores. He had been charged with homicide. Rollin Singer had not been held.

  “At least he didn’t kill anyone this time,” Sergeant Block said. “It was the guy’s own buddy who did the killing.”

  But it was Singer’s expertise that had placed the dead boy in precisely the right spot to get his head chopped nearly off, Ireland realized. It also was a matter of pure chance that the second youth wasn’t dead. The possibility that the truck might kill him must have occurred to the little man as he threw the boy in front of it.

  “This one make the papers?” the inspector asked.

  “No. The papers are so bored with Hunts Point violence that police reporters seldom drop in to check the blotter anymore. They just phone to ask if anything newsworthy has happened. I thought you might not care to have this one mentioned, so I didn’t.”

  “Good,” Ireland said approvingly. “I don’t want any crime news deliberately suppressed, but I’d just as soon Mr. Singer’s exploits not be mentioned unless some reporter specifically asks about him.”

  The homicide team investigating Rollin Singer’s first kill had run a check on him through the Bureau of Criminal Identification. There was no local package on him. Ireland decided it was time to be a little more thorough. He got off a wire to FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C., and the answer came back early in the afternoon. The little man had no criminal record.

  The inspector decided the situation had reached the point where higher authority should be informed of it. He phoned Assistant Chief Inspector Horace Fitzer, police commander for all of the Bronx, and told him about it. Fitzer said he would consult with the D.A. and call back.

  Instead, it was Bronx District Attorney Lyle Corrigan who phoned Ireland about a half hour later. He asked the precinct commander for a detailed report on all three cases involving Rollin Singer. Ireland not only gave him that, but described his meeting with the man in his office following the second mugger kill.

  When he finished, Corrigan said, “This man is deliberately killing these muggers, Inspector. I know something of jujitsu in its ancient form, because I had some YMCA training in both judo and karate while I was in college. If he’s as expert as he claims, he could have subdued his attackers without killing them.”

  “Maybe,” Ireland agreed. “But it would take more than a personal opinion to convince a jury he used more force than necessary to repel attack. Even if they suspected he had, can you visualize them convicting a respectable businessman for murder when all of his victims were dope-addict muggers who died in the act of attacking him with weapons when he was unarmed?”

  After a period of silence the D.A. emitted a reluctant, “No.” Then he added, “You know this character is going to continue to kill muggers, don’t you?”

  “I suspect it.”

  “You also know some reporter is bound eventually to learn what’s going on and make a sensational story out of it.”

  “Uh-huh. Which is the main reason I called Inspector Fitzer.”

  “It’s going to put the 41st Precinct in a pretty poor light to have it publicized that police protection is so poor down there, a resident’s only chance of survival is to become a jujitsu expert.”

  “It’s going to put the whole Bronx in a poor light,” Ireland told him. “You know how these things go. The minute interest is stirred up about the crime rate here, reporters will start gathering statistics to compare Hunts Point with other areas. And we’re not the only section of the Bronx with a crime problem.”

  There was another period of silence before the DA. said slowly, “It’s also going to present me with a choice of the frying pan or the fire. If I don’t try Singer for murder, my opponent in the next election can charge me with coddling a psychopathic killer. If I do, he can hit me for persecuting an innocent man whose only crime was defending himself against criminals who never should have been on the street in the first place if I had properly done my job of prosecuting them for previous crimes.”

  “What do you suggest?” Ireland asked.

  “I want to talk to this Singer man. When can you get him to my office? On second thought, too many reporters drop in here at unexpected times, and one just might get curious about who he is. When can you get him to your office?”

  “He made it at five of six last time. I can phone him at his beauty salon and ask him to drop by again this evening.”

  “All right. Inspector Fitzer and I will be there a few minutes before six, unless you call me back that you can’t arrange it.”

  Ireland didn’t have to call back, because Rollin Singer readily agreed to make the meeting.

  Inspector Horace Fitzer, a burly man of sixty, arrived at the precinct house at a quarter to six. District Attorney Lyle Corrigan came in five minutes later. He was a tall, slightly stooped man who wore horn-rimmed glasses and somewhat resembled Henry Kissinger. Rollin Singer showed up five minutes after the Bronx D.A.

  After introductions, and after everyone was seated, Lyle Corrigan said, “I’m not going to beat about the bush, Mr. Singer. I’m familiar enough with the original art of jujitsu as you practice it to know you wouldn’t have had to kill any of your attackers in order to subdue them. Or at least not three of them. I’m convinced you are deliberately killing.”

  Singer examined him quizzically and quite calmly. “I think you would have considerable difficulty establishing that in court, Mr. Corrigan. I will go on record right now, under oath if you desire, that my sole intent was to protect myself against attack in all three instances. I assure you all three deaths were quite accidental.”

  Burly Horace Fitzer said in a surly voice, “You’re wasting your time, Lyle. This guy is obviously a psychopathic killer who thinks he has cleverly figured out a legal way to get his kicks. You ought to disabuse him of that notion fast by dragging him before a grand jury.”

  The little man gazed at the Bronx police commander without resentment. In a pleasant tone he said, “Mr. Corrigan knows he could never get an indictment, let alone a conviction, Inspector.”

  The district attorney said, “Let’s try a little reason in place of name-calling. If you do not enjoy killing, Mr. Singer, may I assume you prefer to avoid any more of it?”

  “Of course.”

  “Well, as long as you continue to reside in Hunts Point, it is probably inevitable that you will be subject to further attacks. It would solve the whole problem if you simply moved elsewhere.”

  Rollin Singer gave him a disapproving look. “I understand that in Moscow you have to live where you are told. I wasn’t aware that as yet we had such police-state restrictions in the United States.”

  “I’m not telling you where to live,” the district attorney said with patience. “I am merely asking your cooperation.”

  “Don’t you think a fairer solution would be for the police to make the streets of Hunts Point safe to walk upon, at least during daylight hours? A couple of years back, one of your medical examiners issued a report with which you may be familiar, based on an evaluation of the nearly forty deaths that had occurred in my immediate neighborhood over a ten-month period. Only two of the deaths were from natural causes, which means the residents of that section have only a one-in-twenty chance of dying a natural death. I consider that a disgrace to the police department.”

  “They weren’t all violent deaths,” Inspector Ireland growled. “I read that report. Over half were from alcoholism and drug overdoses.”

  “True,” the little man agreed. “But fifteen were violent deaths, which amounts to one-out-of-four. That compares to a figure of ninety-three percent of all deaths throughout New York City being from natural causes. There is no way you can make Hunts Point sound as though it were adequately policed, Inspector.”

  With a touch of exasperation the D.A. said, “Then why do you persist in l
iving here, Mr. Singer? You know you are going to continue to be attacked.”

  “Quite possibly.”

  “You also must know that eventually some reporter is going to stumble on the story and blow it wide open.”

  “The thought has occurred to me,” Singer admitted.

  “What do you think will happen then?” the D.A. asked sharply.

  “Two things,” the little man said promptly. “First, I imagine the publicity will bring an abrupt end to attacks on me, because word will circulate among the local addicts that I am not very safe prey.”

  Corrigan grunted. “What’s the second thing?”

  The little man smiled at him. “Why, I think my beauty salon will become the most popular in Manhattan. Women will fall all over themselves to have their hair dressed by a genuine, certified killer.”

  Silence in the room grew to a crescendo. The dapper little man rose to his feet.

  “Is that all you wanted with me, gentlemen?” he asked politely.

  Neither police officer made any answer, merely continuing to gaze at the man in silence. District Attorney Corrigan didn’t say anything either, but he finally gave a bare nod.

  Singer walked out of the room. Silence continued for a considerable time. Presently, Corrigan emitted a deep sigh and got out of his chair and strode to the door.

  “I’ve been considering retiring to private practice for some time anyway,” he commented, and walked out also.

  The assistant chief inspector and the deputy inspector looked at each other. Horace Fitzer stood up.

  “I could have retired six months ago if I had wanted to,” he remarked en route to the door.

  Ireland sat at his desk for a while before rising heavily and plodding over to look out at the complaint desk. Sergeant Block was no longer on duty, of course, having been relieved by the night-duty man some time ago.

  The man on duty, a Sergeant Smithers, was a recent transferee about whom the inspector knew very little. Ireland knew he wouldn’t really be able to put his heart into blasting out an inferior he knew so casually. To bring about a real emotional catharsis it had to be an underling of long and close association.

  He decided he would just have to wait until morning to vent his feelings.

  A PUTTING AWAY OF TOYS

  Originally published Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, April 1974.

  My friends at Columbia University always thought it a little weird that my mother was a nightclub entertainer while my father was a psychiatrist, but actually she would never have developed her act if he hadn’t been a psychiatrist. He taught her hypnotism before they broke up, you see. I doubt that he would have if he had suspected the eventual use she would make of it, because even after the divorce it must have been an embarrassment for a shrink with his exclusive clientele, who routinely used hypnosis on his own celebrity-patients, to have an ex-wife whose nightclub act involved putting people under hypnosis to make them quack like ducks and hop like frogs.

  He never mentioned being embarrassed, at least to me. I never heard him say anything critical about Mother except the rather mild objection that she tried to keep me tied too close to her apron strings.

  I grew up listening to a steady stream of complaints about Dad, though. Although the divorce had been Mother’s idea and neither ever remarried, she never quite forgave him for his failure as a husband. One of her favorite themes was that she couldn’t understand how a man who lost his own wife through total lack of understanding could charge such exorbitant fees to advise others on how to deal with their interpersonal relationships.

  Except for Mother’s complaints to me, their post-divorce relationship was amiable enough because she never mentioned his shortcomings to Dad himself. She was pleasant enough to him when he picked me up on weekends, and when they sometimes discussed such things as my schoolwork or what summer camp I should attend, they sounded quite friendly.

  I can’t recall her ever saying anything nice about him to me, however.

  It was years after the breakup before Mother started her nightclub act. I was only two at the time of the divorce, and Mother didn’t go into show business until I was a freshman at Columbia.

  At least she didn’t go into professional show business until then. As long as I can remember, her act was part of the annual Amateur Variety Show for Charity at the Los Angeles Music Center, she was the star of the annual children’s party at the Beverly Hills Country Club, and she performed at most of the private parties she attended. She really had professional stature for years before she finally turned pro.

  She claimed it was her friends’ urgings to which she finally gave in. Certainly it wasn’t the money, because Grandfather left her something like four million dollars, she received additional income as administratrix of the million-dollar trust fund left to me, and Dad had been paying her a phenomenal amount of child support until I reached eighteen.

  I suspect her real reason was simply that it gave her an excuse to spend a lot of time within visiting distance of me. Uprooting herself from Beverly Hills to follow me to the East Coast would have been hard to explain to her friends, or even to me, but show business gave her a legitimate excuse to be anywhere in the country her bookings took her.

  Coincidentally, they seemed always to take her within no more than an hour’s flight from New York City, so that she got to see me often. Although Las Vegas and Los Angeles were top markets for nightclub acts, she never seemed to have bookings there. I rather suspect that all of her bookings would have been in New York City if she could have arranged it but, by its very nature, a hypnotism act has to be short run, so she had to branch out from there.

  Also coincidentally, she never seemed to have bookings when I was home in Beverly Hills during Easter, Christmas or summer vacations.

  Another thing that makes me feel I was the real motive for her going into show business was the fuss she raised about my going to Columbia instead of to UCLA. She couldn’t understand why I insisted on traveling clear across the country when there was a perfectly good school near home. The fact that New York City was the center of the legitimate theater, and my interest was in eventually writing, directing and producing plays, didn’t strike her as a reasonable argument. Why couldn’t I study medicine and psychology and become a psychiatrist like my father? Or if I insisted on a show business career, why couldn’t I settle for film-making, in which UCLA had an excellent course?

  Dad resolved the argument by becoming stern with her. The only times I can recall him being stern with Mother were occasions when they disagreed about what was best for me. Dad rather witheringly told her she was behaving like a Philip Wylie mom, and if she didn’t soon cut the umbilical cord, people would start laughing behind her back. She gave in then, because she would rather have died than have discovered that people were laughing at her.

  Despite being such a high-priced solver of emotional problems, Dad never quite understood the relationship between Mother and me. I was never in much danger of becoming a mama’s boy. I think I was about eight when I first became aware of her mommish desire to devour me. Most boys would either have given in or rebelled. I couldn’t rebel because I sincerely loved Mother and couldn’t possibly have done anything to hurt her feelings, but I couldn’t give in either. So I worked out my own adroit method to avoid being devoured. It required considerable acting talent, and may be the origin of my interest in the theater.

  I’d say, “Yes, ma’am,” when Mother cautioned me against going near the ocean, but I could hang ten on a surfboard by the time I was twelve. Fortunately Dad always gave me a lot of extra spending money that Mother never knew about, so obtaining equipment was no problem. I kept my surfboards, wet suits and, later on, scuba-diving equipment, at the homes of various friends. They were conditioned never to mention in Mother’s presence any activity we had engaged in that Mother might consider either dangerous or ungentlemanly. Insofar as
I was concerned, the umbilical cord had been cut long before Dad mentioned the matter.

  Apparently Mother wasn’t aware of it, though. She continued to watch over me protectively all the time I was at Columbia U.

  There was the matter of my two previous engagements before Ellen, for instance. Mother hired the Flynn Detective Agency to investigate both girls.

  I have to admit that in each case the investigation prevented me from making a disastrous mistake. The news that Mary Jane Potter had undergone three abortions before graduating from high school nearly destroyed me at the time but, as Mother pointed out, it was certainly better to find out how promiscuous she was before marriage than to catch her in bed with one of my friends afterward; and hearing the tape of Susan Harmon bragging to her roommate how she had hooked the richest jerk in college was hardly good for my ego, but it was better than ending up with that calculating little wench.

  In my senior year, when I found Ellen Whittier, I couldn’t stand the thought of another investigation. I knew it would be impossible to convince Mother that none was necessary in this case so, after brooding about it for a while, I finally decided the only honest thing to do was warn Ellen of what was coming, even at the risk of having her indignantly break off our engagement. I made it clear to Ellen that I heartily disapproved of Mother’s investigations, but was helpless to stop them. I also made it clear that I was quite fond of Mother despite her over-protectiveness and that I hoped Ellen eventually would learn to love her too. I said I realized that might be difficult in view of what her initial impression of Mother must be.