Mysterical-E

He Said, She Says

Cover Of Night
By Gary Clifton

McCoy had been a Dallas cop twenty years - eight a homicide detective. When he was summoned to a Saturday morning fire death at 1:47 A.M., he assumed it wouldn't be routine.

The victim was female and appeared young, burn damage being too severe to accurately tell.

"Tied to that bed," the Medical Examiner bent over the cadaver. "The autopsy will tell
more."

In a half hour, McCoy learned the vic's name was Lynn and she had a roommate, Charlie, who worked as a bouncer at an all night, b.y.o.b. lesbian club on Fitzhugh Avenue. He figured Charlie had been working when her roommate was murdered, so he approached the front door of Couples without cover to deliver bad news. He routinely stepped from sidewalk darkness into the lighted doorway.

Charlie was a dumpy little number, shod in black Doc Marten's, with a long silver chain hanging from her belt, attached to something in her rear pocket - a wallet he thought. A routine flash of his badge normally would have salved the way to a tearful conversation. Instead, Charlie grazed his chin a pretty good overhand right and when she yanked on her belt chain, out came a mace.

McCoy, long past being surprised by much of anything, got both hands on the front of Charlie's shirt and bodily tossed her out the door, down three steps, and onto her head on the sidewalk. He quickstepped down and settled her disposition with a solid kick in the ribs. Yeah, it crossed his mind not to beat up on girls, but this was a little different.

Another body, probably a second bouncer, landed on his back, grappling for a choke hold. He slid away and Charlie's helper landed hard on the pavement. Two, then four more appeared in the doorway. Time, McCoy figured, to give a little ground.

But behind him - there they were - three of them, blocking the street. A good place to die, he thought. One of the three was African American and big. Numbers two and three were smaller, white, and each held one of those metal flashlights which doubled as a club.

"What's the deal here?" the African American stepped forward aggressively. McCoy had a fleeting vision of Attila the Hun.

"Just conferring with Charlie here," McCoy waved his badge, being careful not to make a motion toward the Glock in his rear waistband.

The African American turned to the glut of bodies in the Couples doorway.

"Police business, ladies, everybody back inside...Now!"

Reflections from the corner streetlight twinkled off the silver badge on his chest.

"Why didn't you call for backup?" one of the white officers asked.

"Good question," McCoy said. "Charlie," he looked down, "I came here to give you some bad news, but now I think we oughta talk about a murder."

Gary Clifton, 25 years an ATF agent, 15 more with the FBI. Masters in Psychology, Abilene Christian University. In 1987, while on Secret Service Detail, Washington D.C., typed a long, true war story which was later published in National paperback by Paperjacks of New York and Toronto as Burn Sugar Burn(their title, not mine)