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thou shalt not kill

CLASSIC ROUND ROBIN

Chapter 6

by cb mcwhorter

In Joe’s office, Edie held up a print-out that unfolded to three pages.

“This,” she said, waggling the pages so that they rattled. “Is Earnest Oswald. He’s done it all except be convicted of murder. Not that he wasn’t tried for it.”

“Oswald,” said Joe. ““How come I haven’t heard of him?”

“Because all these dings on his record happened elsewhere,” said Edie, handing the re-folded pages over. “Most recently in New Orleans.”

Catherine had appropriated Jed McGyver’s rap sheet. “This guy, too.”

“Who’s he?”

“Jed McGyver,” Catherine answered as she scanned the pages. “And in Norfolk, Virginia before that.”

“So was Mr Oswald,” said Joe. “Pittsburgh before that?”

“No,” said Edie. “McGyver was in jail.”

“McGyver,” Joe scoffed. “Does he commit crimes with a string and a paperclip?”

Edie chuckled. “No. And he’s nowhere near as pretty.”

“So why am I looking at these gentlemen?”

“Mr McGyver is the new doorman at my apartment building,” Catherine said. She let that sink in for Joe until a thought made her heart stop. “God, I hope the real doorman is OK!”

“Maybe you’d better check on that,” Joe said. “Meanwhile, what are they doing here, and how long have they been here, and who hired them?” He saw a look on Catherine’s face he knew well. “And…?”

“Maybe we need to look into the backgrounds of Dr. Emerson and Rick McLaren.”

“Already workin’ on it,” said Edie. “Stay tuned.” And she headed out the door.

Catherine hurried to her desk. She dialed the manager’s office for her apartment building.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Gibbons, it’s Catherine Chandler.”

“Ms. Chandler! What can I do for you?”

“Well, this is going to sound silly, but I see we have a new doorman and I wondered what happened to Roger?”

“Well, it seems he had to go out of town to his daughter’s. She’s fallen ill.”

“He must be beside himself.”

“I’ll say. He hardly even sounded like himself.”

Catherine’s blood ran cold. “Where does she live?”

“Philadelphia, I think.”

“I hope everything turns out OK.”

“So do I, Ms Chandler. You’re so kind to ask after him.”

Thinking a mile a minute, Catherine hung up the phone, staring blankly at Jed McGyver’s rap sheet. She was startled by a cough from right in front of her desk. She looked up to see Det. Mike Juarez. “Hi!” she exclaimed. “What brings you to the mother ship?”

“You, Ms Chandler,” he answered. Catherine cleared the chair by her desk and he sat. “And you look worried.”

“I am. We just figured out that the new doorman on my apartment building has an impressive rap sheet.”

“Interesting, but is it reason to deny him employment?”

“Well, the story for where the usual doorman has gone is a little thin. Things seem … circumstantial.”

She passed him the rap sheet and let him read.

“What’s this model citizen doing here in New York?” he finally said.

“Dunno, but he’s got a friend with him. And he was seen hanging around Lucy’s place. Took his mask off when he thought no one was looking.” She handed him Oswald’s sketch.

“What’s the doorman’s name?”

“Roger Miller.”

“Got it. We’ll check on him. And it seems that the replacement has an open arrest warrant or two. I’ll contact New Orleans about that.”

“Cathy!” Edie sang out as she nearly bounced across the room. She gave Mike an appraising look and Catherine made introductions. And then Edie nearly erupted. “There is no trauma surgeon named Charles Emerson!”

“Say what?”

“He has a New York license that was issued a year ago, but none of the background information they have seems to match. I started with the medical school listed and they have no record of him. Neither does the surgical residency he listed.”

“Well, the state had to have checked all that out and more,” said Catherine.

“Sure. A year ago. I have a lot more digging to do, but something’s rotten in the state of Lenox Hill, I tell you!”

“Did you just make a Shakespeare reference?”

“Is that from Shakespeare?” Edie asked.

Catherine rolled her eyes.

“Is that the guy you scratched?” asked Mike.

“It is.”

“You wouldn’t happen to have cleared the blood from your fingernails, would you?”

“Of course. It’s on a bandage square in a baggie at home.”

“I have more calls to make. And then I’m going to work on the lawyer,” said Edie. And she bounced away.

Mike was staring at Catherine grimly. She raised her eyebrows at him. “Ms Chandler,” he started. “You need to back away from this.” He held up a hand as soon as she opened her mouth. “Hear me out. These guys are staking you out. They have plans for you. You’re as good an investigator as any I’ve known, but you aren’t supposed to be investigating anything pre-arrest. You’re supposed to work on the prosecutor’s case once I do my job. This is starting to get just weird enough that I think we need to find you somewhere else to stay. The apartment building isn’t safe. And Mr Maxwell agrees with me.”

She sent a poison glance at Joe’s office. “Traitor,” she muttered. “Mike, there’s a ton of work to do.”

“I know. Mr Maxwell doesn’t want you driving any more. We’ll set up a cruiser to get you to and from work. But I want to take you to your place and have you pack up to go somewhere else.”

“Like where?”

“Somewhere they haven’t seen you go.”

“And what’s to keep them from following the cruiser to my hide-out?”

“We’ve done this before, Cathy.”

She huffed.

“Cathy, you’re a witness now.”

“Fine.”

“I’ll be back to pick you up at 5:00.”

It was all she could do to keep from asking him why he thought she left at 5:00.

“Don’t even,” said Joe as Catherine appeared in his door. “I’ve signed off on what Mike has asked. You’ve done enough for his case. You know where two valuable witnesses are – and I’m not asking you where, it’s just that you’re the one who knows. You’ve had contact with these weirdos. You’re the best witness we have right now. You’re not coming into the office.”

“Mike said he could…”

“I know. No. We’ll find you a place with a fax machine.”

She collapsed on the couch. They would find her a place that would set her away from Vincent. Not good. “How incommunicado will I be?”

“Phone contact with me and Mike only.”

“Not Edie?”

“We’ll see. We’ll figure out a way to courier files for you. Stop looking so forlorn. It’ll be fine.”

“It could be months.”

“Maybe.”

“Could I just go to my Dad’s?”

“They found where you live. They can probably find a relative.”

“He’s gonna freak about this.”

“Not the sort of thing he imagined for his little girl.”

“Watch it.”

“Hey, my Mom was the same way. Especially after what happened to my Dad.”

“Oh. I bet.” She sat in thought. “I have an old family friend I haven’t seen in weeks. He lives in a brownstone. And I’m sure he has a fax.”

“Upper East Side, I assume.”

She frowned at him. “I’ll call him.”

Joe turned his phone around and handed her the receiver. She hesitated a moment as she dialed and then nodded and continued.

“Doctor Alcott’s office.”

“Hello, this is Catherine Chandler…,” Catherine started.

“Cathy! Where have you been!”

“Hi, Alice. I know, I need a physical. Can we book it now?”

“Two years overdue. Hang on…”

Catherine rolled her eyes and waited.

“How about the 18^th at 2:00?”

“OK. Is he busy? Could I say hi?”

“Of course.”

“You’re slick,” said Joe.

“Yeah, well, now I have an appointment on the 18th.”

Joe shrugged.

“Cathy!”

“Peter! How are you?”

“I’m fine. What’s up?”

“I need a favor.”

“Of course.”

“There’s a bit of a mess with a case we’re investigating and I need to not be at my apartment. May I hide at your place?”

“Not your Dad’s?”

“Too easy to find.”

“This sounds alarming. I assume this starts now?”

“Probably closer to six. I have a police escort to take me to pack up and then I’ll be there.”

“I’ll have dinner ready. How many policemen?”

“Just one. I think.”

Joe spoke up. “Tell him there will be a ton of instructions for him.”

“My boss says that there will be a lot for you to know.”

“OK. I’m actually going to visit Susan tomorrow. I’ll be gone a couple of weeks. Mrs Hudson will be on vacation as well. So we’ll have dinner tonight and you can fill me in on what’s going on.”

“I’ll see you then.” She hung up and grinned at Joe. “Mike’s getting dinner out of it. Care to come?”

Joe brightened and then frowned “I’d better not.”

Mike huffed as he waited to be forwarded to the fifth department in 30 minutes. The NOPD wasn’t any more organized than the NYPD. Finally: “Latrobe.”

“Yeah, this is Detective Michael Juarez at the NYPD. We got a couple of bad agents whose rap sheets include a lot of activity down your way. Any way you can look up Jed McGyver and Earnest Oswald?’

“Sure. Lemme look.”  There was a pause and rattling of a keyboard. “Ooooh. We have been looking for these creeps. You only have two of them?”

“How many you got?”

“They were running with a couple other guys. Mason Heep, believe it or not, and Philip Henri LeBlanc.”

“We think those guys are going by McLaren and Emerson now. One’s impersonating a doctor.”

“A doctor? Ew. I’ll fax you what we have, but then I can do you even better. I’m gonna put you through to the detectives who would love to see them again. That’s extension 86321, if I lose you.”

Fax and phone numbers were exchanged.

“Ms Latrobe, you are my new dream girl. I thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

“You are so very welcome, Detective Juarez. Good luck getting them off the street.”

Not long after, Mike heard another woman’s voice: “This is Detective Therese Arceneaux. Is this Detective Juarez?”

“It is. Nice to meet you.”

“Could I put you on speaker so my partner can hear you?”

 “Please do.” He then heard office noise.

“Detective Juarez, my partner, Elizabeth Richard, and I are very pleased to hear from you.”

Mike only briefly paused to reflect on two female detectives following these creeps, but only briefly. “I think we have a lot of information to share.”

“Oh, yes. You first.”

So, Juarez told his story. He was gratified to hear the fax machine nearby come to life as he spoke. He wheeled his chair over, stretching the phone cord as far as it would go, to retrieve a handful of pages. He interrupted himself to crow: “Hallelujah! These are our guys!”

“I’m guessing LeBlanc is playing doctor,” said Richard.

“How did you guess that?”

“He used to work with a coroner’s office in Missouri till he was fired for, um, inappropriate activities.”

“I can imagine what that might be. OK, is it your turn?”

Arceneaux spoke up: “They all liked to dress up as vampires down here. And they mostly victimized working girls, about eight of them over the course of a couple years. They filled in the time with larceny and petty cons, although one was a croupier for a casino for a while.”

“Don’t they vet those guys?”

“That’s what I said,” replied Richard. “We got some information from Norfolk, Virginia. They dressed up as sailors there.”

“Wonder what they did in Pittsburgh?” Mike mused.

“I don’t think they did any costumes,” Arceneaux said. “They just lured and killed prostitutes. They really got into the vampire kink here, but hey, it’s NOLA. We see lots of weird stuff down here.”

The conversation went on and on. Mike took notes as fast as he could. He wondered why these guys were dressing-up as they were. You’d think they’d want to attract as little attention as possible. If they were trying to evade recognition, they could go the ski mask route. That was nearly untraceable. It was like they were taunting the authorities. As one of those authorities, Mike resented it.

In the end, the file that had been thick enough already, but only with the accounts of the victims, was gratifyingly thick with information about the perps. It was a good afternoon’s work. He requested arrest warrants, organized the pages in the file and secured the folder. A half hour briefing his captain, and off he went to find Chandler.

Catherine had a moment of panic. “What do I do with the food in my fridge?”

“Pack it up. We can park the car in the garage and load whatever you want. Save one suitcase to go out the front and tell the staff you’re leaving.”

“OK.”

It was longer than she thought before she tossed a raincoat over her arm and headed to the lobby, Mike in tow. He seemed surprised that she didn’t pack up her whole wardrobe, but that most of what she prepared was law books and office supplies.

In the elevator, she muttered to him, “I’m going to try something.”

He followed her out of the elevator across the echoing lobby.

“Mrs Gibbons!” Chandler said. “I’m glad I caught you! I’m being sent out of town for work.”

“Again? Who knew that the DA’s office were such jet setters?”

Mike noticed the doorman twitch a little.

“I wouldn’t put it that way.” Chandler laughed. “My last trip was to Ames, Iowa.”

“Where to now?”

“New Orleans.”

That made Mike nearly twitch, but the doorman actually turned around.

“Well!” said Mrs Gibbons. “That’s better. Have some gumbo for me.”

“I will!” And Chandler swept out of the lobby like a diva. She didn’t even glance at the doorman.

In the car, she said, “I do not like okra.”

Reginald Morris, aka Jed McGyver, unlocked his seedy hotel room and slammed the door. Earnest looked up. “Page the doctor,” said Jed. “We have a problem.”

Reaching for the bedside phone, Earnest dialed as he said, “So, spill.”

“That Chandler bitch? She doesn’t work at her daddy’s law firm. She works for the DA’s office!” He was gratified to see Earnest nearly drop the receiver. He waited for him to hang up before he said: “And her boss has sent her to New Orleans!”

The string of swearing was long.

Dinner eaten, Peter’s kitchen cleaned up, Mike sent home with leftovers and a tricky phone call to her Dad (“I’m not supposed to use Peter’s phone, Dad. They’re probably going to set up a different line for a while. No, you can’t come over until Peter’s back.”), and Catherine was ready to head out Peter’s basement door.  Smiling, she turned to tap out a message to Vincent, only to find him standing right there.