Mysterical-E

He Said, She Says

        The Mayor and the Murder
                                  by Jack Bates

Here’s how I explained it to my lieutenant.

It was getting to be around four in the morning and the Mayor was having another one of his raucous parties. For him, it was probably nearing the halfway point. Yeah, the next day was a Wednesday and he’d have to go into city hall and all, but he was the mayor, youngest one the city had ever elected. Big, powerful looking man who could scare the hell out of you with a scowl and charm the panties of his secretaries with that Cheshire grin.

Still, a party that keeps rolling at four a.m. is a party that has gotten out of hand. Mrs. Mayor had had enough of the loud music, the occasional girlie-girl screams and giggles, not to mention the blatant obscene language she could hear plain as the person next to her in line to check out at Nordstrom’s at Somerset.

Enough was enough. Three times she had gone down there to remind the Mayor he had two small daughters who had school the next morning and if they didn’t want their teachers gossiping about what went on in the mansion, he should shut it the hell up and get everybody out of there.

On the third trip she would have found a young woman dancing on an Ottoman in front of the Mayor. Mrs. Mayor would have naturally confronted the dancing girl. Words would have been exchanged; one of the Mayor’s guys would have tried to intervene. Mrs. Mayor would have gone off in a huff, angry, biting back tears, but she would have gone.

The fourth trip down she wasn’t going to take any prisoners.

She carried with her the Mayor’s college baseball bat, the one he had used to help his junior college into the Division III World Series of College Baseball. A grand slam in the bottom of the seventh or something epic like that. The feat had been in all the papers when he ran for mayor. She should have remembered the story for all the times he told it. It was a heavy aluminum bat, 30 ounces, the rubber hand grip slightly worn. Scuff marks marred the finish where the home run ball had touched it before its epic flight. He hadn’t lifted it from the back of the closet in almost ten years except to pose for photo ops.

The sliding doors to the entertainment room stood about six inches apart. It was just enough space for her to see the dancing woman pulling off her sweater, her skinny jeans already off, her lithe body moving like a trained serpent in the heat and glow of the fire place, hypnotizing the men and transfixing the Mayor. The music pulsated in Mrs. Mayor’s head. No one seemed to see her push the doors into the recesses, the bat clutched in the fist of her left hand. No one moved as she stepped up behind the dancer and cocked the bat back. No one moved until one of the body guards came in from the kitchen carrying a sandwich the size of a domed stadium. He called out, dropped his meal to the hardwood floor, but had to maneuver around the end of a pool table and along the wall.

Too late.

The first swing would have been enough. It was an upper cut along the right side of the girl’s head. The blow connected just below her ear and against her neck, more than likely snapping it. As the dancer collapsed, The Mayor’s wife swung again hitting the dancer in the forehead and knocking her backwards over her bent knees. Once on the ground, there were one or two more blows and then the bodyguard was there, wrapping his arms around Mrs. Mayor and pulling her back.

The Mayor sat wide eyed in his big backed leather chair, staring at his wife who still clutched the baseball bat now marred with blood instead of the hides of baseballs. She would have waved it at him, pointing at him from below the bodyguard’s hold. She would have sworn at him, screamed at him, not thinking that maybe their daughters had crept down to see what was going on.

The music would have still been blaring, drowning out most of what Mrs. Mayor screamed. Eventually someone would have turned off the stereo.

What happened next was the classic cover up.

I imagine one set of the handlers would have gotten the Mayor’s wife upstairs as another set hurried the Mayor from the scene. What remaining guests that were there were probably ushered into another room and asked to wait until the authorities got there. They weren’t to make calls, text, or Tweet. Do nothing, they would have been told, and the Mayor will reward you handsomely.

Not much more than hour later, Damar Sims, the Mayor’s Chief of Staff, would have arrived to begin the clean up. It couldn’t have been anyone else. It would have had to have been Sims. He would have first gone into the entertainment room, where the Mayor’s men would have already begun to clean up the blood and gore, and taken a look at the young woman’s body. He would have looked at his watch and seen it was an hour before dawn and he would have told two of the men cleaning to wrap the body in the Persian throw rug she was on and dump her. They would have asked where and he, in his cool demeanor, would have said, Alaska. Sims would have watched the carpet get rolled around the woman’s body to note any tags or markings that could lead the police back to the Mayor’s mansion. If there had been any, he would have removed them. As the men lifted the body, he would have told them to tie ropes around either end and tie the ends of the ropes to cinder blocks and dump her in the river.

Once done with the clean up, Sims would have gone in to talk to the five men and three women to see who he had to deal with. The men would have all looked like they were on the verge of pissing their pants. He would have had the men moved into a separate room so he could concentrate of the women. Two of the women would have been dates of two of the men, dates the men’s wives would not have known about. The third woman would have looked like trouble to Sims. He had her moved to yet another room. Once everyone was in place, Sims would have gotten down to business. The men’s silence would be bought easily through blackmail, the two escorts through money. But the witness in the third room, Sims couldn’t be so sure about.
And he was right.

Dionna Newbill, the witness left in that third room, came to me with the story.

I took it to my lieutenant and told him as much.

“Let me see if I get you,” he said. He shifted in his wooden swivel chair. I heard the creaks and wasn’t sure if it was the chair or his spine. “You’re telling me that a murder took place at the mayor’s mansion.”

“I am.”

“And who told you this?”

I looked down at my spiral flipbook. It fit in my palm. I hadn’t made the switch to a hand-held electronic device. Some things just don’t gel with me. “Her name’s Dionna Newbill.”

“And who is this Dionna Newbill?”

“Postal worker.”

“What in the hell is a postal worker doing at a party at the mayor’s mansion at four in the morning?”

“All that walking must be good for her.”

“So you’re saying she’s good looking?”

“I don’t think she was invited to the mansion because she knows the zip code, Ty.”

“Why did she call you?”

“Maybe because I work Homicide?”

I knew he wanted it to go away. I could tell he wanted it to go away. He took his right hand and pulled it down over his tired old face. The wrinkles stretched out and he reminded me of a cadet at the academy I used to partner with at times. The wrinkles sprang back into place as he scowled.

“Clarence, how many years you been a detective?”

“Eighteen.”

“How many were you on the streets before that?”

“Six.”

“You got twenty-four years in and you want to go chasing ghosts?”

“Why are you afraid to look into this?”

Ty got defensive. I shouldn’t have called him on it. “I ain’t getting afraid.”

“I know you’re not. I’m sorry, Ty. It’s just that we’ve been covering this punk’s ass since he was old enough to ride a tricycle. Now he’s our mayor and this city is eyeball deep in graft and scandal. Someone from the outside has found a loose screw in his armor.”

“You’re still pissed you couldn’t bust him on a possession charge when you were driving a beat.”

“I’m pissed that someone may have gotten killed and we’re not going to do anything about it.”

“First of all, Clare, let me ask you this. Who got killed?”

“A woman about twenty-three years in age.”

“Boy, that’s solid now, ain’t it?”

Our eyes met. I knew where he was going with it. “Miss Newbill didn’t know the girl’s name.”

“Did she know the name of the three white dudes or the two black dudes or the other two women in the room?”

“As far as I knew, she knew only the mayor.”

“So why haven’t these other folks come forward?”

“I don’t know. It might have something to do with the man Miss Newbill says led them all into different rooms and asked each of them what they saw or knew.”

“And who was this man?”

“She didn’t give me a name. I’m betting he didn’t give her a name either. But I’m also betting it is His Honor’s long time compatriot Damar Sims.”

Ty looked panicked. “Well, did she say if she recognized him?”

“No, she did not.”

“You ain’t got shit, Clarence.”

“I got a witness to a crime. She came to us because she feared something happened to this young woman.”
“And I’m telling you, that ain’t shit.” Ty leaned back in his wooden swivel chair again. The creak returned. He looked out his window into the squad room as he opened a drawer. Ty reached inside it, pulled out a pack of Newports, shook one out, lit it, and exhaled at the ceiling.

I sighed. “What are you doing?”

“I’m smoking.”

“This state just adopted a smoking ban in the work place.”

“So why don’t you arrest me?” Ty turned his head and exhaled the smoke into my face. I stared back. “You ain’t going to do anything because it’s a waste of time to do anything about it. I’m right ain’t I?”

I just kept staring at him.

“It’s stupid to do anything about nothing, Clare. You know that.” Ty took another drag of his cigarette. I knew he wasn’t talking about smoking.

I went back out to my desk and sat down heavily. I looked at the small spiral notebook, tapped its cardboard cover against the edge of my desk. June Watkins, recently promoted to Homicide, sat down at her desk facing me. We weren’t exactly partners; she had taken the only empty desk and it just happened to butt up against mine. Where mine had stacks of papers, hers stayed neat with a set of matching plastic red desk organizers that matched the red framed photo of her fiancé who was stationed over in Iraq. My only picture was of my late wife, Martha.

Junie kept color pencils in one of her canisters. Junie was a bright detective with a talent for doing impromptu sketches of the guys in the room. She posted them on the bulletin boards and let us add the captions. Figured it was her way of fitting in with a bunch of old codgers like me and Ty. I didn’t mind bending her ear when I had some glitches to think through.

“You stop at one of the casinos?” she asked. “Or did you just come in from a smoke break?”

“Lieutenant’s trying to prove a point.” I said. I tossed the spiral notebook on my desk and turned away.
“What’s that?” June asked.

“Notes about nothing.”

“Can I look?”

I swiveled around in my padded seat. “Be my guest.” I sat back and watched her eyes move over the pages. She flipped one paper over the top and read the next. Sometimes she went back and forth; sometimes she just stared at the page. After a while she looked up.

“You know what this is?” she said. Her dark brown eyes searched through mine. She held the notebook out over the line where our two desks met.

“A hornets’ nest.” I said. I took back the notebook.

“Is that what the lieutenant told you?”

I looked away from her and out the window a desk over. It wasn’t much of a view; a boarded up old house.
“When did the witness call?”

“Two days ago. I’ve been sitting on it.”

“When did the murder occur?”

“If it did occur, it happened almost a week ago now.”

“What do you mean ‘if’ the murder occurred?”

I turned and looked at her, leaning back in my chair as I did. “Well, Junie, for one thing, we have no body. We don’t have a report of anyone missing. All we have is what Miss Newbill told me.”

“So she saw it. If we can get her to identify some of the other witnesses, tell her it will help corroborate her story, we can take it from there.”

“Even though Ty says I’ve got nothing?”

“What’s your gut tell you, Clarence?”

“Tells me I’m a damn fool every day.” I gave her a grin. “But since when haven’t I known that?”

Junie laughed. Her face brightened when she did. “Then we’d better get rolling before a real one comes in.”
“We?”

“You don’t think I’m letting you take this one all on your own, do you, Pops?”

“I don’t know, Junie. I don’t think you should. Do you know what this could do to your career if I’m wrong?”

“I even know what it could do to my career if you’re right. This city’s been hurting too long. Someone somewhere in it has to start to pick up the trash. Now come on, let’s sign out before the LT gets nosey.”

I did have to admire her tenacity. I just hoped she realized that whatever way this turned out, it could get ugly for the both of us.

We found Dionna Newbill on a smoke break outside of City Hall. She was standing by her truck talking to a UPS guy. When she saw us walking up to her, she turned away and said something to the UPS man who then turned and went into the building.

“Dionna Newbill?” I asked. I reached for my badge.

“Don’t pull that thing out here,” Dionna said. She looked around. Without telling us to, she moved to the blindside of her truck, away from the immediate windows and we followed. “You the detective I talked to on the phone?”

“I am. This is June Watkins.”

“She your partner or something?”

“Yes.” June said. She waved the smoke out of her face. Dionna gave her a once over.

“Didn’t I tell you enough?” Dionna asked. She flicked the smoldering butt off to the side.

“I can always use more, Miss Newbill. Like do you have any idea who any of the men were that were there that night?”

“The two black dudes I’d never seen before. But the white guys, they’ve been around.”

“Around?” June asked. “How do you mean around?”

Dionna reached into her truck. She rifled through a shoulder bag and pulled out a flyer for Benny Torpedoes, a sandwich shop that now had national franchises. “I mean around.” She held the flyer out to Junie. Ben Carpenter’s face with a metal cap on it resemble the tip of a torpedo smiled back at her over a spread of monster subs.

“Ben Carpenter was at this party?” I asked. My stomach kicked into overdrive as it plummeted. Carpenter was a nobody kid from the east side who built an empire using some special Italian dressing his grandma had developed. Twenty years late he was making a move to buy the local pro-basketball team and move it from its brick and crystal palace forty miles north back into the heart of the city.

“What about the other men?” Junie asked.

“I didn’t know them but you could tell they were made of money. Expensive clothes, graying hair, and their shoes. Nothing cheap anywhere on those men.”

“What about the girl you claim was murdered?”

Dionna Newbill shot Junie a quick glare. “That girl was murdered. I saw the mayor’s wife knock her skull in. I saw things come out.”

“Do you know who she was?”

“No idea. But I think she was with the other two escorts.”

“How do you know they were escorts?”

“Same way I knew those white dudes were rich. You can tell. And hell, you know they weren’t their daughters.” The UPS guy came back out. Dionna waved and smiled at him. He pulled down the brim of his cap. “Y’all got any more questions? I still have to get to the mail room here.”

“I got one.” I said. “Who was the guy who talked to you?”

Dionna shook her head. “Couldn’t tell you. But I can tell you he was creepy. Weasely little man. Black. A mustache that looked like a tired old caterpillar crawling under his nose. Gray around the ears. He wore gloves the entire time.”

‘Damar Sims,’ I thought. I didn’t say anything.

“We good now?”

“There is just one more thing, Miss Newbill,” Junie said. “It’s been a week. Nobody has reported anyone missing. No one matching your description of a murder victim has turned up.”

“You think I’m making this up?”

“No.” Junie gave her a polite smile. “We need something to go on. Do you think you could describe her to me? I do some doodles around the office of my colleagues. I thought maybe if you could give me some more time, I could draw her out. It would give us something to work off of.”

“I don’t have the time right now.” Newbill said. She hoisted the letter bag over her shoulder.

“I could meet you somewhere for lunch. My treat. While you eat, I’ll draw.”

“She’s pretty good.” I said. Newbill looked away from Junie and at me.

“Maybe she is. I just don’t know if I have the time.”

“You had enough time to call and report a crime, Miss Newbill,” I said. “If it bothered you that much, I’d think you’d want to see it through.”

“It’s not that,” Newbill said. “I’m just a little creeped out still by the moustache man.”

“We’re the police, Miss Newbill,” Junie said.

“Yeah. Well, who do you think was there that night?”

“There were other people there?” I asked.

“The mayor had his boys with him. Big boys. I’m betting some of those guys were off duty and doing a little moonlighting on the city’s dime.”

“Did they say they were cops?” I asked.

“They didn’t have to say anything.”

“We’re only interested in the girl,” Junie said. “I need just a little more of your time. If something happened at the mayor’s mansion, this will help us a lot.”

Newbill looked at both of us. “All right,” she said. “I’ll meet you at one. Hella’s on Monroe. I like that fried cheese.”

“I’ll be there.”

Newbill went into city hall. Junie looked at her watch. It was twelve fifteen.

“You want to go over there with me?” she asked me.

“I’ll drop you off there. I think I’m going to have a Torpedo for lunch.”

Like so many other business owners with a stake in the survival of the city, Benny Carpenter moved his corporate offices from the northern suburbs back to the downtown area. Thirty or so years ago everyone migrated out of the city, mostly to the north. There was land up there, cheap at the time. Now it’s so overcrowded the river is flowing south again, where real estate is prime and prices are just right.
Benny Carpenter had no reason to suspect I’d be stopping by, which meant he’d have no reason not to see me. He stood uneasily behind his desk when his secretary opened the door and let me in. He held out his hand. I shook it.

“I’m sorry, you’re detective--?”

“Clarence Henderson.”

“Did something happen at one of my shops?” He motioned for me to sit down. Carpenter was already almost in his seat.

“No, sir. I’m not here about your local businesses.”

“Well, that’s a relief.” He let out a noise lost somewhere between a laugh and a cough. He was probably hoping I wasn’t there for the reason he now suspected I was there. Carpenter fumbled around on his desk. “Is there a charity you’re collecting for? I usually have my accountant take care of that but since you’ve paid me a visit--.”

“Mr. Carpenter, this ain’t easy on me.” Carpenter stopped rummaging around his desk. Our eyes met. He knew. “I got a call about a week ago from someone who was at a party at the mayor’s mansion. This witness ID’ed you as another guest.” Carpenter tented his fingers and put his hands up to his mouth. He closed his eyes. A smile appeared behind his hands. I think he might have been praying.

“Did this witness give you my name?”

“She—that is the witness,” I shifted in the leather chair. ‘Damn fool,’ I thought of myself. “The witness knew who you were.”

“So if I say I wasn’t there, you’ll think I’m lying.”

“All I want to know, sir, is did something happen there that night?”

“I wouldn’t know if I wasn’t there.” His hands came away from his mouth. He folded his arms on his desk and looked me directly in the eye.

“But you were there.”

“Tell you what, detective. You give me the date, time, and the witness’s name and I’ll have my lawyer get back to you.”

“The witness’s name is confidential, Mr. Carpenter.”

“Then I guess we have nothing more to talk about.” He stood up. I followed suit, calling his bluff.

“All right. But I think you should know one of your two buddies who was there has pretty much confirmed what I was told.”

“Impossible. McCloud would never--.” Now it was Carpenter who stopped himself.

“Randall McCloud was there.” I didn’t phrase it as a question. I gave it to him as a statement. Carpenter stared uneasily at me, not quite certain what I knew or thought I knew, so I squeezed his lemons a little tighter. “He claims the escorts were not with him. They were with you and the other friend.” I gave him a wink. Carpenter sank back into his chair. His face was whiter than a sheet of printer paper. I leaned over his glass topped desk, putting my weight on my finger tips. “Look, all I want to know is what happened to the girl?”

But Carpenter wouldn’t budge. He closed his eyes and turned away. When he opened them again, he stared out his window at the site where he hoped to build the new basketball arena. Whatever his involvement was in the events at the party, his knowledge of those events could sink his hoop dreams before the court ever got laid. I let myself out.

I figured Carpenter was on the phone to Randall McCloud before I even got on the elevator. Wasn’t much point in trying to get in to see him; the wall of silence was going up fast. McCloud, much like Carpenter, was a self-made man who turned his attention to the auto industry. Tires, to be exact. A guy couldn’t drive through any town, municipality, or city in the state without seeing the four winged wheels floating on a heavenly cloud.

All these guys making their millions off a dying city, a dying state, squeezing out our last nickels and dimes. Maybe I was bitter. Maybe all I had for the last thirty years was a dream of being a cop and here at the tail end I was getting dragged into a situation that could pretty much slap me right out of it if I pushed too many of these benevolent carpetbaggers too far.

I could have opened that comic book shop with my cousin, I thought. But why read about crime fighters when I could be one? Maybe Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben was right. I did have a great responsibility. That should have been reward enough.

I went back to the precinct. I no sooner walked in the squad room then Ty ripped open his door and barked at me to get my ass into his office. He didn’t even offer me a seat before he started tearing me a new one.

“What in the hell are you doing?”

“My job.”

“Don’t give me that sanctimonious bullshit, Clare. You went digging where I told you not to go.”

“You’ve been telling us all year to follow tips and leads.”

“Credible tips and leads.”

“How am I supposed to know if they are credible if I don’t investigate?”

“You want to know? You listen to me. I know. I know because fifteen minutes ago I got a call from the chief who got a call from the mayor’s office that’s gotten a couple of calls from some people who don’t like what you’re accusing them of. I had to take her shit so now you’re gonna take mine.”

“I didn’t accuse them of anything.”

Ty’s mouth snapped shut. His eyes bulged. It took about ten to fifteen seconds then he exploded on me. He ran out of expletives fast. After ten minutes he collapsed into his chair. One of his hands held the phone still in its receiver. He looked at the keypad then told me to get out, throwing in one of his favorite expletives after all. I went back to my desk. Junie Watkins was back.

“I’m sorry, Clarence,” she said. I waved her off. “I should have left it alone. I pushed you into it and now you’re in trouble.”

“I’m not in trouble, Junie. Ty’s being pressured not to investigate the mayor and he knows it’s bullshit.”
“So what’s he going to do about it?”

“What he has to.”

“And what are you going to do?”

“What I have to. Did you get a picture?”

Junie nodded. She looked around then slid a manila folder over the desk to me. I opened it up. The dead girl was beautiful. “Go make a couple of copies of this.” I said to Junie sliding the folder back once I was sure Ty wasn’t watching us.

“What are you going to do? Leak it to the news?”

“No. I just want some backups in case this one gets lost. And then I want to go visit a guy I used to deal with a lot when I was in Vice.”

I didn’t go until after my shift. I didn’t want to draw any of Ty’s attention. Any work that was going to be done about Dionna Newbill’s claim of a murder at the mayor’s mansion was going to have be done off radar and on my own. Things changed when I got to my car. Junie Stood next to it.

“Shouldn’t you be getting on home?” I asked her.

“I’m just going to be sitting there wondering if I should call you or not.”

“About what?”

“About her.” Junie held up a copy of her drawing.

Luis Villalpando ran one of the city’s premier escort services. I figured guys like Benny Carpenter and Randall McCloud wouldn’t be out with the common escort. The Mayor would expect a higher class of hooker, although Luis’ girls were supposed to be arm-candy only.

Right.

Anyone who believes that believes a new governor will bring economic stability back.

A few years had gone by since I’d last stopped by Luis’ office. A lot had changed. For one thing, the floor and walls were dark marble. For another, he had a receptionist. A pretty girl. She looked like she could be the girl next door to some of those suburban boys. Her smile lit up her face and she held up a finger as she spoke into her hands free headset.

“Talent House Entertainment. Can you hold please?” She nodded to the voice on the other end and pushed a button on her phone. She looked at us with desperate eyes. “This place is a zoo today. How can I help you?”
“I was looking for Luis Villalpando.”

“Do you have an appointment?”

Before I could answer, the girl held up a finger again and spoke into her head set. Same line, same poise. When she was done she looked at us.

“Could you tell him Clarence Henderson is here?”

“He’s in a closed door meeting with Mr. Eastwood.”

Now it was my turn to give a desperate look. “Eastwood? You mean like?”

The door behind the receptionist opened. Luis popped his head out.

“Hey, Cindy. Could you--.” His face froze when he saw me. “No way.” Luis moved out of his office, closing the door behind him. He came around the marble counter and took my hand. “Look at you, Mr. Henderson. How are you?”

“I’m good, Luis.” I introduced Junie, filled him in on my life since the move to Homicide. Then I asked him what was going on with him.

“I went legit, man. You know why? Hollywood came here.

“And it needed hookers?”

Luis laughed. “I never pimped, C.H. Remember?”

“But now you’re legit?” Junie asked.

“Yeah. Remember the 80’s? Music videos? Sometimes I’d get calls from these video makers for dancers and hot girls. I had them both. Well, some of those directors moved up the ladder to movies. They started contacting me for extras. Eastwood is in there right now looking for talent for a film he wants to shoot here.”

“So the escort business?” I asked.

“No more.”

“But the strip clubs?”

“Doesn’t hurt to diversify. Now why are you here, C.H.?”

“I was hoping you could help me with her.” I pulled out a copy of the dead girl. Luis took it and looked it over.

“She’s a looker. She missing?”

“We don’t know.” June said. “We’re trying to find out who she is. If we know that, we can go further.”
“What’s her story?” Luis asked. I told him about her being with a group of escorts who were seen with Carpenter and McCloud. I didn’t say where, I didn’t say why. Luis was smart enough to know not to go further. He shook his head.

“Women with that caliber of client mostly freelance off the Internet now. They use names like Discreet Pleasures or Quiet Angels. They make a connection and their email gets passed around. Hey, listen. I’d like to give you more, but I have to get back in to Eastwood.”

He shook my hand. Junie and I left. It felt like another dead end, but Junie offered to invest some time that night on the internet looking into local escorts. It could be a long shot, but sometimes that’s what it takes to catch a break. I dropped her off a block from the precinct to avoid running into Ty. I asked her to call me if she thought she came across something.

My mind was a million miles away from me as I drove home. Alone in my car at the end of a crazy day, I wasn’t really thinking about driving. Besides, everyone I know has a story about sleep-driving, that trip in a car where all of a sudden he looks around and thinks, ‘How in the hell did I get here?’ Truth is he drove perfectly fine even though his attention wasn’t so much on the path he was taking as what he was thinking. I think it’s called double tasking. Whatever it is, I know that even though I was thinking about the day’s events and the center piece of those events, my driving was not erratic.

I got pulled over a block from my house.

As I was getting my badge out, the officer knocked on my window. He was a large man. Powerfully built. He leaned an arm on the roof of my car and gave me a cold, dark stare.

“Evening, officer,” I said. “I fail to engage my directional?” I held up my badge.

“I know who you are, detective,” he said.

I looked him over. “So you’re going to let me off with a warning?”

“Just this one time.”

“So something did happen at the mansion.”

The patrol officer’s face showed a flicker of surprise. It settled back into his menacing look. “All I’m saying.”
“Then let me say something,” I looked at his name plate on his shirt. “Officer Graham. I don’t know what oath they made you take when you signed on, but I’m hoping it’s still the same one I took. You know that part that goes ‘We will conduct ourselves with unwavering high standards of honesty, trust, and ethical behavior?’ I still adhere to that. Do you?”

“Look, detective. You’re making this out to be more than it should. Leave it be.”

“A young girl was murdered.”

Officer Graham rolled his eyes over me. He turned away with a grunt of indignation and a softly mumbled, “Shit.” He went back to his cruiser, got in it, and shot past me. For something that wasn’t supposed to have happened, there were a lot of people trying to make sure I believed them.

I didn’t feel like eating when I got home. I opened a can of split pea and ham soup anyway and made some popcorn to sprinkle over top of it. Buttered and salted popcorn was better than crackers in pea soup, don’t know why. Martha used to make it like that. Of course, the soup was homemade and the popcorn fluffier. Then again, everything Martha did was better when she did it then when I tried to copy it. I used to sit at the table enjoying her meal, letting the day roll off my back while she grilled me about what went on in the city. She used to let me bounce ideas off of her, sometimes telling me my logic was damn near jammed and jaggled. Martha always helped me to cut through the bull. After she died, if I couldn’t sleep, I’d think she was sitting on her side of the bed and I would just talk waiting for one of her chuckles where she rolled her eyes and shook her head as she told it to me straight. She had this thing she’d tell me when the day had been downright rotten, when I’d wanted to just give up trying to make the city a little bit better. Martha would give me her loving grin and say, “Oh, hell. This day is done. Try again tomorrow.”

I put the left over pea soup in an old sour cream container and put it in the fridge next to the other old plastic containers I’d filled with other meals I never finished. In the back, away from all these containers filled with lies against what their labels said was a single bottle of beer. I grabbed it. I dragged the beer and my sorry old butt into my living room, plopped myself down in front of the TV, and surfed while I drank.

Seven o’clock. Wheel of Fortune time.

Midway through the second puzzle my cell made its noise. Junie’s call. Man, the girl was tenacious.

“I got a name,” Junie said.

“I’m not surprised.”

“Fontella Garllick.”

“Come on. That her stage name?”

“Real name. Her escort name was Ella G Fantasy.”

I spit beer. “No.”

“See for yourself. I sent you a link in your email. You near your computer?”

“I’m near my television.”

“Go look.” She sounded as eager as a kid on Christmas morning.

“All right. Take a few minutes to boot up.”

I clicked off Pat Sajak. The rest of my beer went with me into my den; the room that at one time was going to be our nursery. Now it housed my years of service awards, some recognition plaques for saving a kid from a burning car, another for single handedly stopping a robbery. There were pictures of me and Martha as well. Only things missing were the pictures of the babies we had wanted.

“Hey, Junie. Can you do something for me while I’m waiting for this relic to boot?”

“Sure.”

“Take a look out your window. Tell me if you see any black and whites or maybe an unmarked car on your street.”

“I live in a town housed, Clarence. You hear about something going on over here?” I told her about my encounter on the way home. She told me she didn’t see any marked or unmarked cars in the parking lot outside her town house. About the same time, Fontella Garlick’s face appeared on my screen. There was no doubt that it was her.

“I’m surprised she used her real name.” I said.

“That’s because you’re looking at her Facebook page. Click on her face.”

I followed her instructions as she explained the trail she had followed. First, a search for Detroit area escorts. Next, a few random clicks on various links. Finally she hit a website called Detroit After Hours Party Scene that put up pictures of various after hour houses and tagged the photos. She got the first name off one of the pictures then did a search for Fontella plus escort plus Detroit. It took a little while but she managed to find the right combination of key words. Another Facebook page led her to Fontella’s. I kept clicking through photos of Fontella in various poses and at various parties until I stopped on one in particular. It showed Fontella giving a cheek to cheek hug to Dionna Newbill.

“How many of these pictures did you click through?” I asked.

“You found the one of her and Dionna.”

“Why wouldn’t she just tell us she knew her?”

“Postal worker moonlighting as a high-class call girl? She has a lot to protect. More than just a job, I’m betting.”

“Like kids? That explains why she wanted to let someone know what happened and felt she could do it because she wasn’t going out as Dionna Newbill. I’m betting that night at the party she wasn’t going by her real name.” It meant Dionna Newbill had some street smarts with her. Damar Sims would only know her by her escort name.

“I just sent you the link to Fontella’s escort page.”

I refreshed my inbox. I opened the email and clicked the link.

Fontella Garlick aka Ella G reclined on a red plush sectional beneath a hanging pole lamp. She wore little more than a sparkling gold body stocking. The flecks of gold appeared to vibrate up off her caramel skin. She draped one hand over an upright knee and rested her weight on her lowered arm. Her soft eyes would have drawn any guy into her lair.

I shook my head and mused into the phone. “I wonder if she knew.”

“Knew what?” Junie asked.

“That her escort name would remind people of a sad poem.”

“Come again?”

I explained it to Junie just so she wouldn’t beat herself up for not catching it. I told her she did great hunting Fontella down. I warned she still couldn’t go around talking about what we knew. Tomorrow we’d do a little more looking into Fontella Garlick’s background. The funny thing was we were going to have all the answers before we even had a case.

I slept well that night for the first time in a while. I didn’t wake up at two in the morning to listen for Martha’s breathing or try and talk to her. When I woke up, I emptied the fridge of all the leftovers except for the pea soup which I had for breakfast. I was feeling pretty good going into the precinct the next morning.
It all changed the minute I stepped into the detectives’ room.

My desk was in the usual disarray. Junie’s desk was empty. All of her red plastic organizers were gone. Her framed photo of Eric in his fatigues was gone. Even the caricatures on the bulletin boards were gone. It was as if someone was trying to make it look like she had never even been there. I didn’t even get a chance to put my jacket on the back of my swivel chair. Ty yanked open his door and yelled for me to go in. A couple of the guys in the room gave me a look something akin to a dead man walking. I had never been so right in my life.

I stepped into Ty’s office and he closed the door behind me. Alicia Tukes, the Deputy Chief of Police, sat behind Ty’s desk. She stared at me coolly. I nodded at her.

“Sit down, Clare.” Ty said. He held out his hand to the chair. Ty rested half his bottom on the corner of his desk. “I think you know Deputy Chief Tukes.”

“Ma’am.”

“Detective.”

It stayed quiet in the room for about thirty seconds. Ty broke it up. “Clare, Deputy Chief Tukes is here because--.”

“I think I know why she’s here, Ty.” I kept my eyes on Tukes. “Is this a permanent thing, a suspension, or an involuntary transfer like Detective Watkins?”

“You’re too old for the streets, detective.” Tukes said.

“You put that girl back out on the streets? She was good.”

“Unlike you, it won’t be a permanent situation.”

“You’re firing me?”

Tukes smiled as she leaned over Ty’s desk. “You’re resigning.”

“And if I don’t?”

“You’ll be suspended indefinitely without pay pending an investigation into allegations that you are unfit to fulfill your duties as a police officer.”

“What allegations?”

“I have three signed affidavits that say you are no longer capable of doing your job.”

I looked at Ty. He kept his eyes on the floor.

“Now sign, detective. You’re still vested. You can still get some or part of your pension.”

I looked from Ty to the deputy chief. There was regret in Ty’s eyes. There was a sense of power in hers.
“You ain’t going to say anything, Ty?”

“Sign it, you damn fool.” He at least said it while looking me in the eye.

I reached a hand for the pen Tukes held out to me. It shook a little when I took hold of it.

“Read it over, Mr. Henderson.” Tukes said. “There is also a gag order that goes along with this.”

“A gag order not to discuss something that didn’t happen?” I asked.

“A gag order not to discuss, write, post, or in any way ever promote any case you have worked on in that in any way links to the mayor.”

“This is outrageous."

Ty stood quickly. He leaned over me. “I warned you,” he said. His teeth were clenched. It came out like hot steam. “Now do the sensible thing and protect your ass. Sign it.”

Every fiber of my being told me to drop the pen and face the heat. The only thing that stopped me from doing just that was Martha’s voice. It was like a whisper in the wind rushing through my ear.
I signed the resignation.

If I knew one thing about my city it was that eventually someone would slip up. My money was on the youngest mayor to ever get elected. He was fool enough to believe he was untouchable. His reasoning would eventually lead to his downfall. He might say something off the cuff or reply to the wrong email or even shoot off a text or two that he wasn’t supposed to. He wouldn’t do it right away, but he would do it soon.
When it happens, when Fontella Garlick’s story begins to leak out, I’ll be ready to tell it. Twenty-four years ago I thought I could make the city a better place. I still believe that. Why?

Well, my Martha said it best.

This day is done.

I’ll try again tomorrow. I have plenty of those left.