Some Degree of Murder

Tuesday, April 13th Davenport Hotel, Morning

VIRGIL

My luck had improved with cabs since the visit to the cemetery. After the hotel concierge called, River City Taxi sent over a clean, white Taurus. The driver was a pudgy ball of a man with shiny silver hair. I climbed into the cab and he asked in a low, gravelly voice. “Where to?”

I rattled off the location from memory. He glanced over his shoulder at me with a disapproving look.

“What?”

He turned forward and shook his head. “Nothing.”

The cab lurched forward as he pulled away from the curb. A couple of minutes later we were hurtling east on I-90. The cabbie never said a word while we were on the freeway and I didn’t try to get him to talk. I stared out at the passing landscape, absently wondering what life would have been like if I stayed.

At the Altamont Avenue exit, the car swayed when the cabbie turned to the off ramp. We were on Third Avenue as we approached Altamont and a dirty 7-11 occupied the southwest corner.

“Stop here.”

“But this isn’t where you said you wanted to go.”

His eyes met mine in the rearview mirror and I pointed over at the convenience store.

The car bounced into the parking lot before pulling in front of the building. A smirk grew on the cabby’s face and he shrugged. “You don’t belong here,” he said.

“Why’s that?”

“It’s rough.”

“I’m fine.”

“Want me to wait?”

I pulled my money clip from my pocket and peeled off a ten dollar bill. He reached over his shoulder and carefully took the money from me.

“Need change?”

With a shake of my head, I climbed out and swung the cab door shut.

Inside the 7-11, a blast of cold air from the vents and Bon Jovi from the speakers shocked my system. It was April in River City which was definitely too early for air conditioning.

The clerk behind the counter was a heavy-set black man with a round face and sleepy eyes. Beads of sweat formed on his forehead and he wheezed as he walked.

From a back cooler, I pulled out a bottle of water and went to the counter.

“Good morning, sir,” the clerk wheezed.

“You get a lot of kids coming in here?”

His eyes challenged mine. “Why?”

I put my bottle of water on the counter and pulled out a picture. “You ever seen this girl in here before?”

“You a cop?”

”No.”

“Why you want her then?”

“She’s my daughter.”

He watched me for a minute before deciding to speak. “Yeah, she came in here a while back. Haven’t seen her in at least three, maybe four weeks.” His breathing was shallow as he spoke. “She really liked those Chic-O-Sticks.”

I raised an eyebrow at him.

“Those orange sticks,” he said pointing at the candy rack.

“She ever tell you where she was staying?”

“Why would she do that?”

“I don’t know. Did she?”

“She never said.”

“She ever come in here with anyone?”

He rolled his eyes up as he thought. “I don’t think so. She was a nice kid though. Polite.”

I searched his eyes and knew he was holding something back. His eyes flicked away from me but quickly returned. “What else?” I asked.

He pointed at the picture. “She didn’t look like that.”

“What’d she look like?”

His tongue darted across his lips before rubbing them together. “Strung out.”

“Dope?”

The big man shrugged. “I don’t know, but she looked like she’d seen better days.”

He rang up my water and I dropped two dollars into his hand. Outside the store, I opened the bottle and took a swig.

River City is divided into four sectors by two streets-Sprague, which runs east to west, and Division, which runs north to south. This makes finding your way around the city fairly easy. The streets south of Sprague run in consecutive numbers. I was three blocks from where the newspaper article in my pocket said she was found.

As far as newspaper articles go there was a lot of speculation and very little facts in the narrative. The detective handling the case was non-committal in his responses. They must train them in the academy to dodge questions. I’d been in town two days and nothing new on her murder was in either the newspaper or on the local news. Another girl was found dead so she was getting the few minutes of airtime devoted to sensational stories. The rest of the time was spent lamenting the city’s current budget crisis and a certain city council member who was discovered to have a lesbian lover.

I headed northbound on Altamont until I found the bingo lot where her body was found. I could smell shit somewhere in the area. The morning sun was out and there was still light dew on the weeds sprinkled around the lot. My nose crinkled reflexively as I tried to shake off the stink.

The article in my pocket said she was found next to a dumpster behind the bingo hall. I walked slowly over to the area, trying hard to keep the anger from boiling over. The only green dumpster stood next to the building and the surrounding fence line. Nothing remained on the ground near the dumpster. I couldn’t determine exactly where she was found. My fingernails dug into the palms of my hands and my teeth ground into each other.

The smell of shit dragged me back to reality. I unclenched my fists and checked my shoes to see if I was the one carrying the smell around.

Turning away from the dumpster, I pulled out a soft pack of Camels and shook a cigarette free. I lit it up, hoping to calm my nerves and kill the smell of crap that hung in the area. When it did neither, I left the parking lot.

I wandered the streets, watching the area’s inhabitants and their activity. With black slacks and a polo shirt underneath a clean black jacket, I stood out like a blood stain on white carpet. For that reason I spent some time dropping into a couple of antique shops, a car parts outlet and an adult book store. All of the businesses, especially the sex shop, were dingy and depressing. The clerks stood behind their counters with watchful eyes, waiting for someone to snatch an item and bolt from their shops.

Outside the stores, the eyes of the street were more watchful. Slow moving Buicks with middle-aged men behind the wheels prowled the streets. Their eyes flashed past the blacks who stood in the doorways of defunct businesses, waiting for the right customer to request their product. But the drivers didn’t want dope. They were looking for the drug that only men need.

A number of women and girls in tight skirts sauntered up and down the sidewalks. Their slow walks emphasized their hips and signaled prospects that they were on the menu.

More police cars traveled through this area in a half-hour than I had seen anywhere else in the world. All it told me was that everyone knew the action was down here. And no one seemed to be hiding it.

Near the west end of the Sprague strip, sat a club house for the Brotherhood of the Southern Cross. Four mean looking Harleys stood out front of the square, white building. Heavy steel bars covered the windows and the front door. Two cameras, each at an opposite end, monitored the front of the building. I didn’t walk around to the back, but I was sure there would be cameras around there as well.

Next to the clubhouse was the La Playa Motel and across the street was the Palms Motel. Two low cost stop-and-flops for the hookers and johns. I turned around and stared back down Sprague towards the activity. Cars whizzed past in both directions while the whores and dealers continued their work. Something nagged at me about the area but I couldn’t place it.

I finally shoved the thought to the back of my brain and walked back toward downtown, trying to figure out what the hell my daughter was doing in this part of River City.