Survival Of The Fittest

36

“Body's zipped, almost ready to go,” said the Central Homicide detective. “Your basic frenzied cutting.”

His name was Bob Pierce and he was in his fifties, thick in the middle with wavy gray hair, a big jaw, and a Chicago accent. On the way over Milo told me he'd once been a top solver, was two months from retirement now, thinking only about Idaho.

This evening, he seemed resigned and stoic, but his fingers gathered and released the bottom hem of his suit jacket, pinching, letting go, pinching.

He stood with us on Fourth Street, at the mouth of the alley between Main and Wall, as the crime-scene crew worked under portable floodlights. The lights were selective and the filthy strip lined with dumpsters sported strange, blotchy shadows. A rotten-produce smell poured out to the street.

“Working alone today, Bob?” said Milo.

“Bruce has the flu. So what's your interest in our alleged felony?”

“Cold case of mine, a retarded kid, so I'm looking into any 187s with handicapped vics.”

“Well, this one was handicapped. Coroner said his eyes were clearly nonfunctional. Atrophied sclera or something like that. Probably born blind. Yours black?”

“No.”

“This one is.”

“Any ID?” said Milo.

“Lots.” Pierce pulled out his notepad. “Medi-Cal card, a few other things next to the body, along with his wallet, all the money gone.”

He put on half-glasses, and flipped pages. “Melvin Myers, black male, twenty-five, home address on Stocker Avenue.”

He closed the pad and turned to watch the techs.

“Stocker's the Crenshaw district,” said Milo.

“Don't know what he was doing here but one of the uniforms said there's a school for the disabled not far from here- off L.A. Street, near the garment outlets. I'll find out tomorrow if Myers was a student.”

“What happened to him?”

“Walking through the alley, got stabbed from behind about ten times with a big knife, then ten more times in the front.”

“Overkill,” said Milo.

“I'll say.” Pierce's hands worked faster at his hem. “Can you imagine, unable to see it, just feeling it- this is some so-called alleged civilization we're allegedly living in.”

He directed the last words at me, staring, as he'd done off and on since being introduced. Was it my unshaven face or the fact that Milo had introduced me as a consultant?

Milo said, “Any estimates when it happened, Bob?”

“Sometime late in the afternoon. M.E. said the body was pretty fresh.”

“Who discovered him?”

“One of our patrol cars- how's that for something new? They were rolling up the alley, saw a leg sticking out from behind one of the dumpsters. At first they figured him for a crackhead who fell asleep and got out to roust him.”

“Late afternoon,” said Milo. “Working hours. Pretty risky.”

“Not if you're a no-brain sociopath. And he got away with it, didn't he?”

Pierce gave a sour look. “The thing is, even though it's working hours, this particular alley's been pretty quiet, lots of the buildings on Wall are vacant. And for the most part the people who work either on Main or Wall stay out of it because it used to be a crack market. The only citizens who do go in there are the janitors who take the garbage to the dumpsters.”

Milo peered down the alley. “The dumpsters give good cover.”

“You bet. One after the other, like rows of shacks. Reminds me of those little green houses in Monopoly.”

“So it's not a crack market anymore?”

“Not this week. Policy order from headquarters: Mayor says get a handle on quality-of-life offenses, let's make our downtown a real downtown so we can pretend we're living in a real city. HQ says knock the dope rate down pronto but without any additional personnel or patrol cars. Which is about as likely as O.J. feeling remorse. The way it plays out is we up patrol for one alley, the crackheads move to another. Like Parcheesi- bumping and moving, everyone goes in circles.”

“How often are the patrols?”

“A few times a day.” Pierce pulled out a pack of mints. “Obviously not at the right time for poor Mr. Myers. Helluva place for a blind guy to get lost in.”

“Lost?” said Milo.

“What else? Unless he was a crackhead himself, looking for something recreational, didn't know the action's three alleys over. But I'm choosing innocent til proven guilty unless I learn different. At this point, he got lost.”

“I thought blind guys had a good sense of direction,” said Milo. “And if he went to school around here, you'd think he'd know about the neighborhood, be extra careful.”

“What can I tell you?” said Pierce. Another glance back. “Well, there it goes.”

Coroner's attendants lifted a black body bag onto a gurney. As the wheels moved over the ravaged asphalt, the car rattled.

Milo said, “One second, Bob,” strode over, said something to the attendants, and waited as they unzipped the bag.

“So you're consulting,” Pierce said to me. “I've got a daughter at Cal State, wants to be a psychologist, maybe work with kids-”

Milo's voice made us both turn.

He'd walked past the coroner's station wagon, was standing near the east wall of the alley, half-concealed by a dumpster, the visible slice of his bulk whitened by a floodlight.

Pierce said, “What, now?” He and I went over.

The chalk outline of Melvin Myers's body had been drawn unevenly on the pitted tar. Right-angled. Folded. I could see where his foot had stuck out.

The oily rust of bloodstains all around.

A pothole in the center of the outline created a symbolic wound.

Milo pointed at the wall. His eyes were bright, cold, satisfied but enraged.

The red brick was blackened by decades of smog and grease and garbage distillate, a mad jumble of obscene graffiti.

I saw nothing but defacement. Same with Pierce. He said, “What?”

Milo walked to the wall, stooped, put his finger near something just inches from where the brick met the floor of the alley.

Behind the spot where Melvin Myers's head would have rested in death.

Pierce and I got closer. The garbage stench was overpowering.

Milo's fingertip pointed at four white letters, maybe half a handbreadth tall.

White chalk, just like the body outline, but fainter.

Block letters, printed neatly.

DVLL.

“That mean something?” said Pierce.

“It means I've complicated your life, Bob.”

Pierce put on his reading glasses and pushed his big jaw up to the letters.

“Not exactly permanent. Usually the idiots use spray paint.”

“It didn't need to be permanent,” I said. “The main thing was to deliver the message.”