Manhattan Noir

THE LAUNDRY ROOMBY JOHN LUTZ

Upper West Side

That it was blood didn’t seem likely.

Possible, but not likely.

Laura Frain stood in the dim basement laundry room of her apartment building and studied the stained shirt beneath a sixty-watt bulb that should have been a hundred. The rust-red stain on Davy’s blue collar looked as if it might be stubborn. And there was a similar stain on the shirt’s right sleeve.

She glanced around the laundry room, as if she feared she wasn’t alone. But she was alone. Most of the women in the building and not a few of the men didn’t like coming to the basement room to use the aging, coin-operated washing machines and clothes dryers. Especially since Wash Up, a spacious and well-lighted laundromat, had opened down the block. The basement laundry room-smelling of mold and bleach-was oppressive, even spooky, with its dimness and shadows and slitlike windows that looked out on an air shaft and hadn’t been washed in years. The truth was, she hated being there, but felt she had little choice.

The laundry room was one of the reasons she and Roger had rented the apartment, so she was determined to take advantage of the convenience. Besides, it was cheaper than a laundromat or dry cleaners.

Laura, her husband Roger, and their sixteen-year-old son Davy had lived in the Upper West Side apartment for the past two years, after being displaced when their longtime apartment on West 89th Street had gone condo. The new apartment had finally begun to feel like home.

Like her husband, Laura was in her late thirties. She and Roger had only last month celebrated their seventeenth wedding anniversary. She smiled, thinking as she often did that she was part of an attractive family. She still had her dark good looks, her lush auburn hair, and bright blue eyes. And Roger, while never a handsome man in the conventional sense, was still trim and attractive in his homely, Lincolnesque way. Davy, of course, was beautiful, with Roger’s craggy features and Laura’s bold blue eyes and wavy dark hair. A heartbreaker, Davy, though he didn’t date much.

Laura turned on the washer and listened to the ancient pipes rattle along the ceiling joists as the tub began to fill. She spread out the shirt with the stain facing up, stretching the material tight over the top of one of the nearby dryers, then reached for the aerosol can of spot remover. She sprayed the stain, then dipped a scrub brush into the warm water gushing into the machine, applied some soap to the brush’s bristles, and began to work on the stain.

When it had completely disappeared, she started on the similar stain on the shirt sleeve. Red sauce of some kind, perhaps even a thick red wine. She scrubbed until that stain had disappeared too, then continued to scrub.

When the washer was almost filled, she put the shirt in by itself, so it would be good and clean.

Davy’s shirt.

“David,” he said.

The pretty blond girl looked at him and cocked her head to the side to demonstrate she was curious. Her hair was combed straight back but ringlets had escaped to dangle in front of her ears and dance when she moved her head.

Davy smiled. “I thought you asked me my name.” They were in a video arcade near Times Square, and it was noisy not only from the games but from the traffic sounds drifting in through the open door.

“You heard wrong,” the girl said, but she returned his smile.

He shrugged and turned back to his Mounted Brigade game, swerving his horse right and lopping off the head of one of the charging Dragoons. An abbreviated shrill scream burst from the machine.

“Holly,” he heard.

He turned back to face the girl. “A beautiful name.”

She laughed cynically. “Yeah. So’s David.”

“You come in here often?” he asked, ignoring the trumpet signaling another charge.

“I don’t come in here at all. I stopped in to get out of the rain.”

He glanced outside and saw that a light summer drizzle had begun. People on the sidewalk were looking up at the sky in wary surprise, some of them opening umbrellas. Then he took a closer look at the girl-woman. She was older than he’d imagined, in her twenties. It was the renegade ringlets that threw him, and her clothes. She was dressed young, in tight jeans, a sleeveless Mets shirt, and dirty white jogging shoes. She had an angular, delicate look, emphasized by her swept back blond hair and the way she wore her makeup, heavily applied, with eyeliner that made her blue eyes even bluer. Both her ears were pierced in three places, and each piercing held a tiny fake diamond stud.

“Seen enough?” she asked.

He laughed. “Not by a long shot.” He turned away from his video game so she’d know she had his full attention. They always liked that. “You go to NYU?”

“How’d you guess?”

“Your shirt.”

She looked down at what she was wearing and gave him a quizzical look.

“NYU girls are Mets fans,” he said.

“All of us?”

“Without exception.”

“I actually like the Yankees.”

“Okay. With one exception.”

She gave him a different kind of smile this time. Kind of slow and lazy. It made her look even older. He liked that. “Let’s get out of here,” she said. “It’s too fucking noisy.”

“Just what I was thinking.”

She widened her smile. “Yeah. I know what you were thinking.”

“I got a call from the high school,” Laura told Roger when he phoned from the office at Broadwing Mutual, where he sold all kinds of insurance over the phone and managed outstanding policies. Laura wasn’t sure exactly what his job entailed, but he earned enough to support the family in reasonably good style-if they watched their pennies. “Davy’s skipped his afternoon classes again.”

“A habit.”

“The school’s concerned.”

“He’s a senior. He’ll go away to college next year.”

“If he graduates.”

“He’ll graduate, the tuition we pay the place.”

“He’s got to attend some classes.”

“And he does attend some. Davy will always do at least enough to get by. That’s the kind of kid he is. You worry too much, Laura.”

Or not enough.“He probably won’t be home in time for dinner, either. That seems to be the pattern.”

“So he’s out someplace having fun. He’s a young man now. You want me to talk to him?”

“No.” She knew her husband was bluffing. He wouldn’t talk to their son even if she insisted. She’d known for years the kind of relationship Roger and Davy shared. The late night trips down the hall when Roger assumed she was asleep. The faint squeal of the hinge on Davy’s bedroom door and-

“Laura?”

“I don’t see any reason to talk to him,” she said. “It probably wouldn’t help, anyway.”

“Davy’ll be all right. I can just about guarantee it.”

“Okay, I’ll accept that guarantee.”

“That’s my girl.”

“Will you be home for supper?”

“No, I’ve gotta work late. Be about 9 o’clock, I’m afraid.”

“Okay, I’ll see you then.”

“Don’t worry, Laura. Promise?”

“Sure,” she said, and hung up the phone.

She hadn’t mentioned the stained shirt to Roger. What would be the point?

They sat in the pocket park that was squeezed between two buildings on East 51st Street. The more they talked to each other, the more she thought they had a lot in common. Enough, anyway.

He was young, all right; Holly could see that even in the dim light from cars passing in the nearby street. But there was something about him, a deep sort of confidence despite his age, as if he’d been around. Maybe more than she had.

“Mind if I ask how old you are?”

He gave her a slow smile that got to her. “Sure, I mind. You afraid I’m jailbait?”

“No. Women don’t think that way. Besides, you’ve got old eyes.”

“You trust me to be old enough and I’ll trust you.”

“To do what?”

“To be gentle with me.”

Holly laughed. “Listen, I’ve got nothing but booze at my place.”

“We don’t even need that.”

She grinned. “C’mon, David. I might not even have that, but you can help me look.”

“I’m good at finding things,” he said, standing up from the bench. “Like, I found you.”

Less than an hour later he slid the long blade of one of her kitchen knives in at the base of her sternum, then up at a sharp angle to the heart. He’d worked out that method from books and basic medical research on the Internet. When he withdrew the blade, it made a muffled scraping sound on her rib cage. It was a sound he liked and made a point to remember.

Holly died quickly on the kitchen floor, not even aware of falling. The last two years, her friends, her lovers, her neat but small apartment near the college, all of it slipped away from her so, so fast, somewhere in the darkness beneath her pain.

The last thing she saw as the light faded was David, nude, standing near the sink, removing objects from the drawer where she kept the knives. More knives. There was a kind of studied purpose about the forward lean of his young body and his intense concentration, as if he were just beginning something rather than ending it.

“Another girl’s been murdered and carved up down in the Village,” Roger said, reading the folded Times as he sat at the kitchen table and sipped his coffee. “The news media’s calling the killer the Slicer. Not very imaginative.”

“I don’t think I want to hear about this at breakfast,” Laura said. She was sitting across from Roger, pouring milk over a bowl of cracked wheat cereal with raisins in it.

“The guy must be a frustrated surgeon. Or a butcher.”

Laura stood up and stalked to the window, standing with her back very straight and staring out over the fire escape.

“Take it easy,” Roger said. “I didn’t mean to spook you.”

Without turning around, she said, “Two weeks ago, the morning after another girl was killed the same way, I found what might be blood on Davy’s shirt.”

“So?”

“I found blood on his shirt this morning, too. Do you want me to show you?”

Roger picked up his cup, then paused, as if he’d changed his mind about coffee this morning. He placed the cup perfectly in its saucer. “No. I don’t see the necessity.”

“We could ask Davy if there’s a necessity.”

“Simple as that?”

“Yes.” But she knew it really wasn’t that simple. She was terrified of how Davy might reply. Even more terrified of what might follow. The media, the police and judges and juries, the system. Once the system, this city, had you by the throat, it shook and shook until there was nothing left of you. It might do that to Davy. To his family. Wasn’t it always the family’s fault? Over and over you heard that, how the killer was himself a victim.

Look at me. His mother. Look what I’m thinking. A victim and killer. Beautiful Davy.

It could be true. That terrified her more than anything.

Still, she had to know for sure.

“We could find out without telling Davy,” she said.

“It’s absurd even to think such a thing.” Roger sounded angry now. She understood why.

“We can’t simply do nothing. At least we can figure out what to do if we must do something.”

“I don’t follow you,” Roger said, sipping his coffee and making a display of calm.

“I don’t want you to follow me,” Laura said. “I want you to follow Davy.”

Two weeks later, when Davy emerged from his room after doing his homework, he said goodbye, then left for one of his unannounced destinations. This time neither Laura nor Roger pressed him for an explanation. Roger counted to twenty, then followed Davy.

“You’ll phone me?” Holly said as her husband left the apartment.

“I’ll phone you.”

Roger followed his son to a subway station, then boarded a car behind Davy’s and watched at each stop until he was among the passengers streaming out onto the platform.

Davy had gotten off at a stop in the Village. Roger hurriedly squeezed through incoming subway riders before the doors slid closed, then followed him up to the street.

It was a warm, pleasant evening, and plenty of people were out strolling the sidewalks and eating at outdoor cafés, so it was easy to keep Davy in sight without being noticed. He was unhurried yet seemed to walk with purpose, as if he knew where he was going rather than simply ambling around enjoying his surroundings.

Davy turned a corner, then made his way through a maze of narrow, crooked streets that were fairly dark but less crowded. Roger had to fall back, and it became more difficult to follow without being seen.

Suddenly Davy slowed and looked about, as if searching the block of old brick apartment buildings for an address. Roger picked up his pace, and from the other side of the street saw Davy enter the lighted vestibule of a beat-up structure whose bricks had years ago been painted white. Davy craned his neck slightly as if speaking into an intercom.

Roger jogged a few steps and saw that there was no inner door that needed to be buzzed open; Davy had simply announced himself. Roger watched his son take two wooden steps to a small landing and rap gently with his knuckles on the door to an apartment on his left. Moving closer still, Roger glimpsed a tall, thin, blond girl open the door and usher Davy inside.

Roger walked back across the street and studied the windows of what must be the front west ground-floor apartment, the one Davy had entered. There was protective iron grillwork over the windows. Shades were pulled, drapes drawn tightly shut. Only narrow angles of light made their way outside.

Feeling like an undercover cop-hoping a real undercover cop wouldn’t notice him-Roger dug his cell phone out of his pocket and called Laura.

“He’s in the Village visiting a tall blond girl-woman,” he said, then explained in detail his location and Davy’s, and how they’d gotten there. “I just caught a glimpse of her, but she looked very pretty. Maybe in her twenties.”

“You sound jealous.”

That seemed an odd thing for Laura to say. Was it in my voice?“So what’s our move now?” he asked. Laura seemed to have taken charge of the operation. “Should I bust in and yell for them to freeze?”

“You shouldn’t make light of it,” she said.

“Maybe we both should. All we’ve found out is Davy’s visiting a girlfriend-if he’s lucky.”

“Remember the blood on his shirts.”

“If it was blood.”

“I’ll come down there,” Laura said. “I’m going to join you.”

“What if Davy leaves before you get here?”

“If he does, let him leave. Don’t let him see you.”

“Then?”

“We’ll go into that apartment building and ring a doorbell.”

Roger didn’t notice Laura at first. She must have walked close to the buildings, on his side of the street. He saw that she was wearing a dark jacket, jeans, and her jogging shoes.

“Is he still in there?” she asked.

“No. He left about ten minutes ago.”

“How did he look?” Laura’s eyes shone like a cat’s in the dim reflected light of the streetlamp at the corner.

“He looked like he always looks. He seemed… calm.” Laura was standing motionless, in a strangely awkward yet poised position. “I doubt if anything happened in there,” Roger added, wondering himself how he could possibly hazard that guess.

“Let’s find out.” Laura started across the street.

Roger gripped her shoulder, stopping her. “And tell the woman what?”

“That we’re Davy’s parents.”

“For God’s sake, Laura!”

“We’ll tell her we’re taking a survey,” Laura said. “Or that we’re collecting food for charity.” She walked out from beneath his hand and he fell in behind her as they crossed the street and entered the building.

The pale green vestibule was more brightly lit than it appeared from outside-which was reassuring-and smelled as if it had been recently painted. Even so, there was fresh graffiti on the wall above the mailboxes in crude black lettering: God is watching over somebody else.

“It has to be that one,” Roger said, pointing up the stairs to the landing. He could see a brass letter and numeral, 1W, on the door to the girl’s apartment.

Laura pressed the brass button and they heard a distant buzzer inside the apartment.

There was no sound from the intercom.

They went up three wide wooden steps to the landing and waited at the door.

Nothing happened.

Laura knocked. Waited almost a full minute. Knocked again.

She glanced over at Roger.

“She didn’t leave with Davy,” he said. His voice was higher than he’d intended.

Laura turned the doorknob, pushed inward, and the door opened. She stepped inside, and Roger followed. For some reason he wanted to get in out of the hall now, didn’t want to be seen.

There were two dead bolt locks and an unfastened brass chain on the door. The woman certainly hadn’t locked herself in after Davy left.

They moved deeper inside the apartment, which was warm and comfortably furnished. The furniture was eclectic flea market but tasteful. There were art prints on the walls. A bookshelf was stuffed with paperbacks, most of them fiction.

They smelled the blood before they saw it. Roger felt as if his molars had turned to copper along the sides of his tongue, bringing saliva. He knew the stench was fresh blood even though he’d never before smelled it. Ancient knowledge.

The blond woman was sprawled in a wide circle of blood on the kitchen floor. Her long hair was fanned out and matted with blood. Her throat had been sliced almost deeply enough to have severed her head. Her breasts-

Roger had to turn away. He heard himself make a sobbing sound.

“We’re leaving,” Laura said. Her voice was so calm it frightened him.

“Jesus, Laura, we’ve gotta call the police. This-”

“Roger!”

“We’ve gotta tell somebody, no matter what. This is-”

“Don’t touch anything on the way out.”

He followed her. He touched nothing. In a dream. All in a dream. He saw Laura use her sleeve to wipe the outside doorknob after the door to the hall was closed behind them.

Out on the sidewalk, half a block away, they stopped, and Laura stooped low and vomited in a dark doorway.

Roger felt stronger than his wife now. At least he’d kept his food down. He pushed away a vivid image of the scene in the apartment kitchen and felt his own stomach roil. Swallowing a rising bitterness, he pulled his cell phone from his pocket.

“Don’t do that,” Laura said. “Not on a cell phone.”

“If we don’t call the police-”

“We’ll call them from home. We’ve got to talk. Got to talk with Davy. You know what will happen if we call the police. To all of us.”

“There’s no if about it. We’re going to call them. And maybe it should happen. Maybe we’ve all been partly to blame.”

“All of us?” She stared at him, astounded.

He thought for the first time that what had happened tonight, what they’d just seen, might have unhinged her mind. “All right,” he said, replacing the phone in his pocket. “We’ll go home. We’ll call from there.”

That seemed to mollify her, but he knew the subject hadn’t been dropped. They walked on to the subway stop and stood on the platform, which was now crowded. It must have been a while since the last train, so another should be due soon.

Even as he formulated the thought, a cool wash of air moved across the platform, pushed by an approaching train. A light appeared down the narrow, dark tunnel, and an increasing roar chased away all other sound. Everyone moved closer to where the speeding train would growl and squeal to a stop.

Roger was aware of Laura edging back behind him, which she did sometimes to protect her hairdo from the breeze of an approaching train.

When the train was no more than fifty feet away, he was surprised to feel her fists firm in the small of his back, and amazingly he was airborne, out and dropping, blinded by the brilliant light of the train, consumed by its thunder.

After the funeral, life, routine, settled back in. Roger had been dead less than six months, but Laura and Davy seldom spoke of him, and Laura and Roger’s wedding photo was tucked away in a box of his possessions that someday Laura would put out curbside with the trash.

Davy was doing better in school now. The Slicer murders were happening less frequently, as if the killer were maturing and learning restraint. There was no sense of urgency about the murders now in the media. In fact, amidst all the ongoing mayhem of Manhattan, they were hardly news at all.

Laura rarely patronized dry cleaners or laundromats, choosing instead to do most of the family wash herself. She would spend hours in the basement laundry room, scrubbing diligently, removing stains, scrubbing them again and again to make sure they were removed.

Some of the stains never completely came clean, but they were hardly noticeable, so she didn’t mind them. She didn’t see that they made much difference.