by Jim Stevens
“I’m broke, Mister Sherlock.”
“I know the feeling,” I try to console her. “What I’d like to do is bring in a specialist in these matters to consult.”
“Who?”
“His name is Herman McFadden.”
If nothing else, Herman might know someone in the lesbian porn business, especially if he thinks Christina’s photogenic.
Both hookers, or escorts as they like to be referred to, called and asked about their money. I don’t know why they’re so itchy. They are the only ones bringing in any cash. I don’t bother returning either of their calls.
Doris was the last to call and tell me that Brewster was going before an arraignment judge on Friday. “Do you have anything we can use?”
“Not yet.”
“When?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Did you get hold of the idiot cop who arrested him?”
“I put in a call,” I lied. “He hasn’t called me back.”
“What should we do?”
“Get a good lawyer.”
“We can’t afford one.”
“Find one that takes American Express.”
“I tried.”
“Word gets around fast, huh?”
“What should we do, Sherlock? I’m worried.”
These are the first words from Doris that do not ring with sarcasm and evil.
“Plead ‘not guilty,’ claim innocence, and don’t admit to any wrongdoing.”
“And if they ask us to explain?” she asks.
“Lie.”
“Lie?”
“Make up a whopper, the more absurd the better. The judge will have no choice but to delay the matter to a later date. A good lie can always buy you time.”
She was silent for a moment, then said, “This is not the type of advice I believed we were paying for.”
“You haven’t paid me, yet.”
___
Each evening I move the recipe cards around on the Original Carlo so many times that the painting now sports more holes than a pin cushion. I tried my daughter’s advice and rearranged the cards into a timeline, but that didn’t work. I arranged by suspect, but too much overlapped. Worse yet, I found myself asking more questions and adding more cards to the mix. By midnight the second night, so many cards are overlapped that you can barely tell the sky in the painting is bright yellow.
I am almost to the point of giving up when I remove one card, read the question I had written upon it, pick up the phone, and call Norbert.
“When Alvin was rock-uncovered, was there money in one of his pockets?”
“What?”
“His wife told me he always carried a wad of cash.”
“Sherlock, it is one-thirty in the morning.”
I look at my digital clock. “It’s one-thirty-two actually.”
“Couldn’t this have waited until the morning?”
“Probably.”
There is a pause.
“So, did you find any money in his pockets?”
“No,” Norbert says. “No money and no watch, either.”
“Did he wear a watch?”
“Rolex.”
“Maybe it was a random killing, some murderer liked his wrinkled suit, crushed his skull, and took off with his money and watch?”
Norbert’s not happy. “A mugging, in Kenilworth, in his own backyard, on a Saturday morning?”
“Well, it was just a thought,” I admit to the detective. “I haven’t been getting a lot of sleep lately.”
“I was doing quite well in that capacity before you called.”
I wait a few seconds. “You do the pawnshops, yet?”
“Yes, Sherlock.”
“Find the watch?”
“No.” Norbert is breathing deeper and deeper into the receiver.
“One more question.”
“Sherlock, I want to go back to bed.”
“Please, it’s a two-part question.”
He sighs. “Go ahead.”
“Who was Franklin Pierce’s vice president and how did he die?”
There is a long pause. “Goodnight, Sherlock.”
“Goodnight, Norbert.”
___
A number of corporations in Chicago allow their employees to leave at noon on Fridays during the late spring and summer months. I am told they do this because it fosters a positive attitude between labor and management; but in truth they do it because they know nobody does a lick of work on a sunny Friday afternoon.
Tiffany, after an exhausting lunch, is ready to go home for a revitalizing nap before venturing out to dinner and a night of frivolity. She is dropping me off at my apartment when “Breakaway” blasts out of my cell phone.
“Hello.”
“Sherlock.”
It’s Norbert, and I can tell by the inflection that he is not in a joyous mood. “Why didn’t you tell us about the place on Astor?”
“What place on Astor?”
“The one where the cleaning lady described you as an immigration agent.”
“She did, huh?”
“I could have you arrested.”
“For impersonating an INS Agent?”
“That would be the least of the charges,” Norbert says.
Tiffany follows half of the conversation closely.
“Better get your ass over here, Sherlock. You got a lot of explaining to do.”
“I’m on my way.”
I flip the phone closed.
“What?” Tiffany asks.
“I got to go back downtown.”
“Why?”
“They found the condo on Astor.”
“Alvin’s hideaway?”
I look at Tiffany. “You make it sound like someplace Jesse James would hole up.”
“I’m going with you.”
“I thought you had plans tonight.”
“I have plans every night, Mister Sherlock. What do you think I am, some kind of a loser?” Tiffany puts the car in reverse and backs into the street.
“I got to get my kids,” I tell her. “It’s my weekend.”
“I thought last week was your weekend?”
“We switched.”
___
“Are we going shopping?” Kelly asks the moment she climbs inside Tiffany’s Lexus.
“Not right away,” I tell them.
We fight traffic back into the city, which is worse than the traffic going out-a new phenomena referred to as the reverse commute. Care talks about school, the horse, junk food and how dumb boys are.
“They don’t change much,” Tiffany tells her.
“Tiffany,” Kelly asks, “when you were in junior high, did you sit at the number-one lunch table.”
“No.”
Kelly is shocked. “You didn’t?”
“The number-one lunch table is only number one to the people not sitting at that table. I was way above that.”
“Isn’t that what I told you, Kelly?” I say.
She ignores me and says to Tiffany, “You weren’t with the popular kids?”
“I didn’t sit with them,” Tiffany says. “They sat with me.”
Kelly is lost in thought the remainder of the trip.
We arrive at the condo on Astor. Tiffany double parks in line with a squad car, ambulance, Norbert and Steve’s car, and a few other government-issued vehicles.
“This doesn’t look like Nordstrom’s,” Kelly says.
“You people wait in the car.”
There is a cacophony of “No way.”
Inside, the condo is buzzing with activity. Fingerprint guys dust, photographer snaps, evidence techs place little numbered markers around and about.
“So good of you to join us, Sherlock,” Norbert says as we enter the foyer. “And you brought the family along. How nice.”
I give a slight wave and “hey” to the cleaning lady who stands beside Steve Burrell, pointing her finger my way.
Kelly and Care notice the quality of the surroundings. “Thi
s is really neat,” Care says. “Why can’t we live like this, Dad?”
“Ask your mother.”
The doors and windows are wide open, allowing the lake breeze to sweep through the place; but there is a distinct odor present, one I am familiar with.
“How long have you known about the place, Sherlock?” Norbert asks.
“Few days.”
“It was Alvin’s hideaway,” Tiffany informs the detective.
“Hideaway?”
“Told you that was a bad term,” I say.
“How about erotic, secret lair?” Tiffany suggests.
“Works for me.”
A young CPD detective named Jonas Jones joins Norbert, Steve, and I as we stand in the dining room. Jonas’ first question is: “Are you the guy who cold-cocked the D.A?”
“My reputation remains intact, I see.”
“Start talking, Sherlock,” Steve says.
I go through my initial visit to the place, my introduction to the cleaning lady, tell them where to find the wall safes and floor safe in the closet. I tell them about the stakeout, Tiffany’s nap and my disappointment of not discovering more.
“How did you find out about the place?”
“His hooker,” Tiffany whispers out of earshot of my kids. “I try to help him meet a nice lady, but he won’t listen.”
“You should be ashamed, Sherlock.”
“By the way, did you find out the identity of the mystery man? Out front is where I snapped his picture.”
“I think Romo might know,” Norbert says, “but he won’t tell us until he has the chance to ruin any good evidence we would get out of it.”
Out of the corner of my ear, I hear Kelly admonish Care about touching things and leaving fingerprints. “They’ll think you did it and lock you up.”
“You guys find something I didn’t find?” I ask.
“Oh, yeah,” Steve says.
“Let’s get on with this,” Jonas says and leads me into the bedroom of the condo. The odor is much stronger.
He goes straight for the chest, unlatches the hasp. “Ready?”
“Wait,” I say and turn to my assistant. “Tiffany, take the girls into the other room.” The tone of my voice convinces her not to argue.
“We’ll replicate the exact moment of our discovery, so you can benefit from the exact same experience as us,” Steve says. “Lean in…real close.”
The lid is flipped open and a waft of death fills the air. Some poor schmuck has been folded in half and stuffed inside the trunk. His head comes up slowly as he graciously sits up, so we can meet and greet him in a proper manner.
I push my dirty handkerchief to my face to block the odor. He’s young, chubby, has a dark complexion, a full head of black hair, and is clean-shaven. Dressed business casual, no spilled blood.
“You got any idea of who it is?” Jonas asks.
“Yeah.”
“Who?”
“Joey Villano.”
21
A couple rolls in reserve
“Personal friend of yours?”
“I’ve been waiting for him to pop up,” I say. “He was Alvin’s trader, one of the few people who could have known how Alvin was ripping off the securities markets.”
I creep closer and look down into the chest to see if Joey sits on stacks of money. Nope. “He worked with Alvin in his office above the Board of Trade after he got off the floor.”
“You ever meet him?”
“No, Heffelfinger told me about him.”
“Kill the perpetrator, kill the witness,” Steve says.
“Maybe, maybe not,” I say.
“Excuse me, Mister Sherlock.” Tiffany is at the doorway to the room, making sure my daughters are kept at bay. “Could we switch spots so I can come in and see, too?”
“Sure, I’d hate to have you miss this.”
The three detectives follow me out of the room where I meet my daughters.
“Who farted, Dad?” Care asks.
“You don’t want to know.”
Jonas motions to the techs. The crime scene is now theirs for the taking. He is last in line to follow the rest of us through the kitchen and outside.
I take my girls by their hands.
“Another stiff, huh, Dad?” Kelly asks.
The three detectives, me, my girls, and finally Tiffany, who remarks, “Man that guy has certainly smelled better days,” sit on the back patio deck around a glass table.
“You talk to Romo?” I ask.
“I called, assistant said he couldn’t talk,” Norbert says, “maybe his necktie was tied too tight.”
“Who’s Romo?” Jonas asks.
“FBI guy,” Steve tells him.
“My God,” Jonas says, “everybody is in on this one.”
“We should meet next time at ChuckE. Cheese.”
“Cool,” Care says.
We sit back in our chairs, attempting to get comfortable.
“Theories?” One of us was going to ask, it might as well be me.
Steve starts. “I’m leaning toward the mob angle or some group that needs to cover its ass in a securities fraud.”
Jonas asks, “No self-respecting mob guy would ever stuff a guy in a trunk.”
Norbert takes his turn. “Although I don’t see her physically doing it, wife Doris has the clearest motive.”
“I’m still going with Brewster,” Kelly says, surprising everyone at the table. “There’s drugs in Alvin, Brewster getting busted for drugs and both murders were blows to the head. It follows a pattern.”
“Chip off the old block there, Sherlock?” Norbert asks.
“She does have a point.” I turn to my daughter. “Thank you, Nancy Drew.”
Kelly beams.
“Who’s Nancy Drew?” Care asks.
“I have a question.”
“Yes, Tiffany?”
“Why here?” She leans forward for effect. “If they want to get rid of him, why didn’t they whack and dump him in the lake? I would think they’d want us to keep looking for the guy.”
“Too much trouble dumping a body in the lake,” Norbert says. “Ya got to get a boat, weights, weather to deal with.”
“Someone is making a point?” Jonas asks.
I know why; but I’m not saying.
“The big boys are letting it be known,” Steve says, “if anyone talks, the same fate awaits.”
“I’m not sure the murders are connected,” I change the subject slightly.
“You have got to be kidding,” Steve snaps at me.
“At least not in the traditional sense.”
Care looks over to ask me, “What’s traditional sense?”
The other detectives may not like me, but they want to hear what I have to say.
“Maybe, Joey in there is a result of the plan taking a u-turn? Something could have happened, someone could have panicked, a clue got dropped that wasn’t supposed to get dropped, or maybe someone is starting another case to throw us off the first one.” I pause, take a breath. I have their attention. “The biggest problem I see is there are too many motives, too many suspects, too many reasons to kill old Alvin. I mean, have any of us run across any human that liked the guy? He was a cheating spouse, liar, gambler, manipulator, and thief. His business enemies number in the hundreds. Both sons he had by their business shorthairs, his daughter’s kept on a budget, and his employees are standing in the unemployment line. He’s fired his wife and has a couple of ex-wives who aren’t too fond of him, either.”
“What a guy,” Tiffany says.
“Somebody wanted Alvin six feet under, and they were willing to shoot him, blow him up, poison, or trap him in an avalanche.”
“We,” Jonas says, “have a world of possibilities at our fingertips.”
“I’m still leaning toward Brewster,” Kelly says.
I get out of my chair. “Come on, girls, we should go; you need some food in you.”
“I thought we were going shopping, Dad?”
“No, you never shop on an empty stomach. Right, Tiffany?”
“Or after seeing a corpse.” Her agreement is not exactly the positive reinforcement I desired. “Come on,” she says, “I’ll take you to dinner.”
Before leaving, I tell the girls, “Go to the bathroom before we go.”
Tiffany, Care, and Kelly go to the little girls’ room together. When they return, I say, “My turn.”
I lock the bathroom door behind me, go straight to the sink and look underneath. I’m relieved. I next relieve myself the usual way, flush, wash my hands and return to the three detectives, carrying the two shopping bags with toilet paper sticking out of the tops.
“Can I ask a favor of you guys?”
“What, Sherlock?”
“I haven’t had a chance to get to the store this week and I’m all out at home. Mind if I take this with me?”
Before they can say no, I add, “My girls go through toilet paper like water.”
“Sherlock, you have hit a new low,” Steve says.
“Okay with you, Jonas?” Norbert asks the detective who is officially in charge of the crime scene.
“Sure, I got daughters of my own.”
Norbert grabs a couple of rolls off the top as I pass by. “Always good to keep a couple in reserve,” he says, as I lead my crew out of the condo.
___
If it were up to me, I’d do the drive-thru at Superdawg for hot dogs and curly fries; but Tiffany opts for a health food noodle place off Lincoln near Belmont. The kids eat their dinner only because Tiffany eats hers. They want to be cool.
“Where do we go from here, Mister Sherlock?”
“Home. The kids are tired.”
“I mean in the case.”
“I think we have to divide to conquer,” I answer.
“What does that mean?” Care asks.
“Yeah,” Tiffany says, “what does that mean?”
“Don’t you see it as a bit strange that almost everyone in this case has a partner?”
“They do?”
“Brewster and Doris, Christina and Lizzy, Heffelfinger and Millie, even Clayton and his mother.”
“And,” Tiffany blurts out, “the two hookers.”
Kelly perks up at Tiffany’s addition to my list and Care follows suit. “Hookers.”
