A Cold Heart

24

I left the college, got on the 134 East and was headed back toward L.A. when my cell phone beeped.

Milo said, “Last couple hours, I could’ve used you. Grief counseling with Levitch’s mom. Vassily was a wonderful son, boy prodigy, total genius, apple of Mama’s eye, who in the world would want to hurt him. Then I got a prelim report from my Ds. Nothing turned up on the Bristol Street neighborhood canvass, and all the audience members they’ve talked to noticed nothing out of the ordinary. Ditto for the security guard and the parking valets. So whoever offed Vassily either blended in or slipped in unnoticed.”

“You said the audience was older. Wouldn’t a kid like Kevin Drummond stand out?”

“Maybe he went in disguise. Maybe he took a back-row seat in the darkness. Plus, you attend a piano recital, you’re not exactly looking for suspicious characters. There are still some personal checks from the nonmembers to go over. Get over to the college, yet?”

“I did. Kevin Drummond wrote a few arts reviews for the student paper, for the most part nothing illuminating. But during his senior year- shortly before he started GrooveRat- his style shifted suddenly. From straightforward prose to what we found in the SeldomScene pieces. Maybe he experienced some sort of psychological change at that time.”

“Going schizo?”

“Not if he’s our guy. These crimes are too organized for a schizophrenic. But a mood disorder- mania- would fit with the overheated prose and the delusions of grandeur. Which is how Drummond’s faculty advisor described his publishing plans. Mania can mean a loosening of boundaries- and inhibitions. And periodic departures from usual demeanor. The advisor describes Kevin as quiet, unassertive. He had no friends, was very serious, a mediocre student with high aspirations. Not fun to be around. All of which could be the depressive component of a bipolar disorder. Another thing that synchs with mania is the hoarding behavior his landlady described. The history of flitting from fad to fad may very well have been a precursor to a manic break. Mania’s not often associated with violence, but when it is, the violence can be serious.”

“So now we’ve got a diagnosis,” he said. “But no patient.”

“Tentative diagnosis. The advisor also said Kevin felt strongly that commercial success and quality were incompatible. By itself that means little- he termed it dorm-room doctrine, and he’s right. But most college students move past dorm life and develop autonomy. Kevin doesn’t seem to have made big strides in that direction.”

“Arrested development… success is corrupt, so nip it in the bud. Meanwhile, no sign of him, and it’s looking more and more as if he’s rabbited. Petra says Stahl’s been on the apartment like a rash, hasn’t caught a glimpse of the guy. I’m putting a BOLO on Drummond’s Honda but without declaring him an official suspect, it’ll be prioritized at the bottom of the basket.”

“Despite the missing car, it’s possible Drummond’s holed up in his apartment,” I said. “A loner like that, some canned soup and a laser printer could sustain him for a while. Has Stahl checked?”

“He had the landlady knock. No answer, no sounds of movement on the other side of the door. Stahl thought of having her use her master key- go in on pretense of a gas leak, whatever. But he thought better of it, called Petra, she called me, and we all decided to wait. Just in case a search does pull up something serious. Kevin’s daddy is a lawyer. We ever bust the kid, he’s gonna be represented by a shark, no sense jumping the gun and risking an evidentiary mess. Just to make sure, I had a chat with an assistant D.A. who leans toward permissive about grounds for warrants. She listened to what I had, asked me if I was taking my routine to open-mike night at the Comedy Store.”

“So what’s the plan?”

“Stahl keeps watching, and Petra continues checking out Hollywood spots, clubs, alternative bookstores, to see if anyone knows Kevin. I’m going over the file on Julie Kipper to see if there’s anything I missed. I also called Fiorelle in Cambridge and suggested he scour hotel registers for Drummond. He said he’d try, but that was a lot to ask for.”

“One more thing,” I said. “I spoke to Christian Bangsley, China Maranga’s other living band mate. He says China was certain someone was stalking her.” I recounted the incident near the Hollywood sign. “It made her angry, not frightened. The night she disappeared, she was enraged at the band. Throw in drugs and her aggressive personality, and it could add up to a volatile situation.”

“With a guy like Kevin.”

“With any wrong guy. China being buried near the sign is consistent with a stalker. She had a thing for the sign, went up there regularly. Someone watched her, learned her patterns. Maybe she wasn’t picked up walking the streets. Maybe she chose that night to hike, was followed and ambushed. Bangsley said when she screamed, no one heard. Up there in the hills, the sound of a struggle would be muted.”

“What kind of thing did she have for the sign?”

“The story of that starlet flinging herself to her death appealed to her.”

“Unfulfilled dreams,” he said. “Sounds like she and Drummond would’ve had some common ground.”

“Sure,” I said. “Until they didn’t.”