Marked for Murder: The Father Koesler Mysteries:

3

It was bright and very early the next morning when Zoo Tully settled in at his desk. At just seven o’clock, he had entered Police Headquarters at 1300 Beaubien. Everyone seemed surprised to see him check in so early. Especially astonished, though concealing it, was Inspector Walter Koznicki, head of homicide. He had no way of knowing that he was the reason for Tully’s early appearance.

Koznicki habitually arrived well in advance of nearly everyone else in his division. In addition to his devotion to his job, there was a practical reason for his punctuality. The Scene Investigation Reports of the previous day were routinely arranged on his desk. His job was to review each report and assign the investigations to specific officers.

Tully busied himself at his desk, reviewing cases his squad was working on. But he frequently checked his watch, waiting for the right moment to interrupt his superior.

Now.

Tully knocked at the open door. “Walt, got a minute?”

“Certainly. Come in, Alonzo.” Koznicki was one of the few who did not use Tully’s nickname. But then Koznicki never used anyone’s nickname.

“I want the Bonner investigation.”

Koznicki was not surprised at Tully’s brusqueness. The lieutenant was a direct person and Koznicki appreciated that fact. He also appreciated, in more than one sense of that word, that Tully was one of the division’s best and most successful investigators.

Yet Koznicki hesitated. Only someone with a lieutenant’s rank or higher could have made that request expecting that it would be granted. A P.O., investigator, or sergeant would have been forced to go through channels.

The fear was that an officer might want to work on a case in which he had an emotional involvement. The thinking was similar to that which argued against a surgeon’s operating on a close relative. In either case, emotions or prior involvement could easily cloud an otherwise sound judgment. So, even though it was a lieutenant making the request, Koznicki was somewhat hesitant to grant it carte blanche without additional information.

With a gesture toward a huge carton labeled “Homicide-Prostitutes,” Koznicki asked the logical question. “What is so special about the Bonner case?”

“She was one of my snitches. In fact, one of my better sources.”

“So you feel somewhat involved? Responsible, in a sense?”

Tully knew the inspector was testing for an emotional tie. He also knew that though he was emotionally involved he must not let that bit of truth escape or Koznicki might deny him the case.

“Walt, there’s a good chance whoever did this hit her because she was my snitch. It could have been retaliation for some lead she gave me.

“And if that’s a fact—if she was executed because of some information she gave me—then there’s a connection with me. When I come across the perpetrator, I’ll know him. Or, put it another way: I know him already. He’s gotta be a case I worked on—but one that El gave me a lead on. So, among other leads, I can check my files and my memory for the guy who connected El with me.”

This was true enough and it skirted his emotional involvement.

“You are basing this on the modus operandi?”

“Uh-huh. It looks like a mob hit. Somebody kills a prostitute, he kills a prostitute. He doesn’t gut and brand her. There’s some kind of message in that. But it’s different from anything I’ve ever seen.” He pointed at the carton at the foot of Koznicki’s desk. “I’ll bet in all the cases you’ve got in that box, there’s not one like this one.”

Koznicki shook his head. “Not to my knowledge.

“All right, Alonzo, the case is yours. What have you got so far?”

“Besides hunches, not much. El had a buddy. She was too street smart not to. Arlene’s the name. But she wasn’t much help. She wasn’t around when El was picked up. Which means either that our perp was lucky or he knew enough to survey the area until El was alone.”

“Had Bonner told her buddy about any especially weird characters she had been with? Any threats?”

“Not really. Hookers service some pretty odd characters as a matter of course. But Arlene wasn’t aware of anyone who might be anywhere nearly as violent as our perp. And no threats. Just a day-to-day working schedule.”

“Nothing else?”

“Mangiapane and I went door to door in the building last night after the crime scene—by the way, I’m taking Mangiapane with me on this one—anyway Mangiapane came up with one woman, lives in the apartment directly below El’s. She thinks she heard the comings and goings. She says they came in about five o’clock in the afternoon. She heard them go up the stairs. But mostly, she heard them go into the room above hers.

“Apparently, the lady spends her time counting El’s tricks. There were five yesterday afternoon—one of El’s slow days, she said.

“What was interesting was that she can tell when there’s action going on upstairs. She can hear the springs squeak. El’s final trick— the one who killed her—the springs didn’t squeak.”

“He had no other purpose than to kill her.”

“Uh-huh. And the M.E. is undoubtedly gonna find semen in her. But, if the lady is right, it ain’t gonna be the perp’s. So we’re not gonna get a blood type.”

“Prints?”

“All over the room. But maybe none from the perp. He must have touched the tub, but the only prints we could find in or on the tub were El’s.”

“None other?”

“No. And the perp must have handled the stove to heat whatever it was that he branded her with. Again, just her prints.”

“You think he wore gloves?”

“Must have. But how’d he get away with it? How come El didn’t insist he take them off? Or how come she didn’t tumble to something haywire going on?”

“Interesting.”

“That’s not all. The lady downstairs, after she heard the couple go up to El’s room, heard someone come down later all alone. Then she heard someone go up into the room, and then someone came down and went out.”

“Meaning?”

“It had to be the perp. With a trick up there, why would El come downstairs, go out, then come back up? No, I think the perp went out—probably to his car, where he got the instrument he used for branding.

“So,” Tully summed up, “what we’ve got so far: They got to the apartment about five o’clock. They went up. They didn’t get anything on. Instead, he killed her. And somehow, she let him get away with leaving his gloves on. And why not? Hookers are used to quirky customers—to Johns having all sorts of fetishes.

“But he couldn’t bring the branding iron in with him. So, after he strangles her, he goes out to his car, gets the iron, goes back upstairs, drags her to the tub while the iron is heating, guts her, brands her, and gets out. And nobody we’ve talked to yet saw him.”

“And now?”

“Now, I’m going to the autopsy. Then Mangiapane and I will canvass the neighborhood.”

Koznicki nodded. He knew he did not need to tell Tully that time was of the essence. In an investigation, hours were important, days critical. The longer it took to run down a case, the less likely it was to ever be closed.

“One more thing, Walt: I want to arrange for her funeral.”

Koznicki raised an eyebrow, as if to ask what Louise Bonner’s funeral had to do with him.

Tully correctly interpreted the body language. “I’m nothin’—oh, maybe a Baptist once, a long time ago. But El was a Catholic. She used to talk about it every so often. Only she wasn’t very active in it . . . not lately, anyway. She’d just go to church once in a while, almost like when no one was looking. So she didn’t have any church or—what do you call it?—parish. I’m not so sure the average parish would have her funeral.”

Again the raised eyebrow, not quite so elevated this time.

“You’re a Catholic, Walt. I thought you could help me.”

Koznicki spread his hands on the desk. “Alonzo, I am certain any number of downtown churches would accommodate your wish. All you need to do is explain the situation and the pastor would—”

“How about St. Aloysius?”

Koznicki controlled an apologetic smile. “Be fair, Alonzo. St. Aloysius is on Washington Boulevard serving a basically transient group. People go in and out all day. A funeral of any sort there can become a three-ring circus—especially one like the Bonner woman’s is bound to be.

“You might try Old St. Mary’s or St. Joseph, or, even better, Sts. Peter and Paul.”

“The point is, Walt, I haven’t got the time to shop around for a church for El.”

“Then—?”

“How about your friend?”

“My friend?”

“Father . . . what’s his name . . . Koesler?”

“Father Koesler! But his parish is way out in Dearborn Heights!”

“I know. But he’s your friend. He’d do it if you asked him. It would save me a helluva lot of time and it would please El. As a favor, Walt?”

“I will phone him.”

“I’ll check back with you later. . . . I’m obliged, Walt.”

Tully permitted himself a slight smile as he walked the few blocks to the Wayne County Morgue.

It had been late last night as he riffled through his files when the problem of El’s funeral had occurred to him. Ordinarily, he felt no responsibility for the final disposition of the bodies in cases he worked on. If he had, with Detroit’s homicide rate, most of his waking hours would be spent arranging funerals.

El was different. She had friends. It wasn’t that. But none of her friends would be in a position to secure for her what she certainly would have wanted: a Catholic burial. He—Alonzo Tully—was the only one who might be able to pull it off.

But he wanted more than simply a Catholic burial. When the idea first came to him, he, as had Walt Koznicki, initially thought of one of the core city parishes. He knew he wouldn’t have to look far to find one of those dedicated priests who not only would handle the funeral but would do so graciously.

Tully wanted more.

El had lived most of her life well beyond the outer fringe of polite society. He wanted her to have in death what, in life, had been beyond her wildest expectations. He wanted her funeral to be held at a respectable, reasonably well-off suburban parish.

He had liked the idea from the first moment it had occurred to him. But which parish? He had no time, especially with the complex puzzle of her death to solve, to shop around in the ’burbs for a priest brave enough to take on what could easily become a most controversial requiem. He was not acquainted with any priests, in or out of the city.

Then the figurative light bulb had lit over his head: Walt Koznicki’s friend.

Tully, as well as everyone else in homicide, was aware that over the recent years, this priest—Koesler—had participated in some investigations. Always there had been something “Catholic” about the case, something that a priest would be familiar with.

Tully had never had any direct dealings with this priest. But it was common knowledge in the department that Koesler and Koznicki had become close friends.

That, then, was the key: Get Koznicki to ask his friend.

He was sure Koesler would not refuse the request. Tully would contact the priest later, when he had time—whenever that might be—to take care of the details. But for the next few days, it would have to be one thing at a time.

He entered the vast, nearly empty lobby of the morgue.

“Hi,” Tully greeted the receptionist. “The M.E. start yet?”

“He just went down.”

Tully took the stairs to the basement. As he neared the autopsy chamber, that distinctive odor that early on had made him gag became pervasive.

Dr. Wilhelm Moellmann was at work.

Stretched out in long aluminum trays were three corpses. In front of each was a lectern on which was a form with the outline of a human body. Normally, the M.E. moved from one body to another, making notations on each chart, indicating the location of injuries, wounds, and the like.

But today Dr. Moellmann was giving his undivided attention to the body on the middle tray.

Tully and Moellmann knew each other well. The detective attended autopsies on his cases faithfully. And although Moellmann tended to play the flamboyant showman, Tully knew the doctor was one of the most competent medical examiners in the country. Perhaps in the world. Each respected the other’s professionalism and expertise, even if the two were locked into role playing.

Though Moellmann became aware of Tully’s presence, he did not turn to formally acknowledge it. “Your case, Lieutenant?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Interesting. Very interesting. I don’t believe we’ve had one like this before.”

At this point, Tully guessed why Moellmann was giving his exclusive attention to the corpse of Louise Bonner. Like a psychotherapist who has treated too many emotionally disturbed people, the M.E. had autopsied so many corpses that the bodies virtually had lost their distinctiveness. There were so many shootings, drownings, asphyxiations; deaths from sharp and blunt instruments; traffic deaths, OD’s. The medical examiner reaped the maimed shells of what had been God’s most intricate creation. Though it might be noted that Moellmann believed neither in any afterlife nor in God. His incredulity was his peculiar reaction to his work.

Thus, just as the psychotherapist who is sated with manic-depressives, phobics, and the like, so was Moellmann inundated with death pure and simple. The psychotherapist’s interest might be whetted by a rare psychological aberration. Moellmann clearly was excited by the challenge offered by this mutilated body.

“Was strangulation the cause of death?” Tully asked.

“What?”

It was as if Moellmann had been roused from some private reverie. “Oh . . . yes, it certainly seems so. Yes, asphyxial death. There’s a tremendous fullness of blood in the internal organs. But she was not eviscerated until at least—oh, ten minutes after death. Otherwise, the heart would still have been pumping and she would have lost much of this blood.”

Moellmann moved back and forth between the body and the lectern. He made many notations on the chart.

Tully next spoke when Moellmann turned his attention to the mark of the cross on Louise’s breast. His face was only inches from the body as he studied the branding.

“So . . . ?”

“Mmmm . . .” Moellmann touched the edge of the mark. “. . . unquestionably makes this one unique. Makes it a ritual. A ritual killing.”

Ritual. Tully’s brain went into quickstep

He would have to enlist the aid of the news media. This murder, unlike many other killings in Detroit, would make the news—at least the local news. The police as well as the medical examiner’s staff would have to keep certain details from the media. At the same time, they would direct the media not to divulge certain other details to the public. This sort of crime could more likely be solved if the authorities alone—besides the killer, of course—knew all the details.

“What do you make of it, Doc?”

“It’s a cross, of course. The mark seems to have been made by some metal instrument. Very thin. We’ll get exact measurements. Heated. Was there a stove in the room?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Then heated over the stove. There may be two parts to this instrument.”

“Huh?”

“The vertical mark is more clear, more burned in, than the horizontal mark. Possibly the thing comes apart. Then he would have to put it together—fit one beam into the other, as it were. . . . Wait: This is interesting.”

Moellmann was now using a magnifying glass. “There’s some sort of . . . something on this horizontal mark. It looks like letters of some sort. Perhaps just the upper part of letters. It isn’t clear because the breast curves just there. It appears he may have wanted to leave a message of some kind, but failed. Maybe because he hadn’t counted on the curvature of the breast.”

“Can you get me that, Doc?”

“We’ll have enlargements made. But I don’t know that you’ll be able to make heads or tails of it.” Moellmann continued to study the marks. “Definitely the top portions of letters. But it’s almost impossible to supply the bottoms. I can’t make any sense of it. It might be four words. There’s one open space on the left side of the vertical bar and one space on the right side.”

“Nobody knows anything about this but us,” Tully cautioned.

“Of course.”

“It’s the best we’ve got so far.”

“The belt that was used to strangle her was one inch and seven-eighths wide.”

Considerably wider than the average belt. That was unusual—and helpful. Anything unusual was helpful.

From the scrapings taken from under El’s fingernails, it was determined that the belt had been of black leather. Evidently she had clawed at it while being garroted.

The remainder of the autopsy reverted to the routine. It was established that the deceased’s stomach was nearly empty except for the remains of a hamburger. Tully recalled a greasy spoon near the corner of Third and Willis, El’s prime place of business. She had probably stopped sometime yesterday afternoon for a snack. Maybe the proprietor or some of the customers had noticed something.

It was worth a try. Tully returned to headquarters, picked up Mangiapane, and returned to the area in Cass Corridor that belonged to the hookers, their pimps, and their Johns.

Meanwhile, eventually, the autopsy on the body of Louise Bonner was completed. One of the attendants put Louise back together and sewed her up.

The attendant who ministered to Louise had taken an extraordinary interest in her from the very beginning of work today. In fact, he had almost come to blows with another attendant over custody of Louise’s body. The scuffle had to be broken up by the technical assistant who was supervising the attendants. Both men had been warned at this time that they were on probation and could be dismissed summarily. But for a little while, the tussle had been the prime topic of conversation among the technical assistants.

Until that moment, only a few of the assistants had even known the name of Arnold Bush. Now his name would become almost an “in” word and Bush would become the subject of ribald humor, most of it having to do with necrophilia and his willingness to do battle over a dead whore.

But the jokes for the most part were exchanged behind Bush’s back. For Arnold Bush had a short fuse and, despite a very commonplace appearance, he was uncommonly strong. He was a loner. And, especially after this morning’s brief turmoil, he was left alone.

The attendant Bush had vied with for custody of Bonner’s body had bruises on both arms. He showed the bruises readily, hoping for some sympathy. The marks of Bush’s fingers were clearly evident. Anyone who could cause such injury simply by grabbing another’s arms was given a wide berth.

Thus no one else challenged Arnold Bush’s claim to exclusive care for the remains of Louise Bonner.