Читать книгу One Murder at a Time: A Casebook - Richard A. Lupoff - Страница 7

STAR LOTUS

“Why me?” Marvia Plum asked.

Dorothy Yamura gave her the kind of look that cops give other cops when they’re speaking in private. No civilians around. No media around. No politicians around. No civil rights activists around.

“You know, I’d like to be treated as a cop for once. I like to think I made sergeant because I’m a good cop, not because I’m an African-American female.”

“Don’t forget to add single mother.” Dorothy Yamura leaned back in her chair. “And I’d like to think I made lieutenant because I’m a good cop, too, Marvia. Not because the old Irishman was suffering from white guilt over the detention camps. Well, O’Hara’s retired now and I’ve got his job and you’ve got mine and we’ve got a serial killer in Berkeley. At least, I think we’ve got a serial killer.”

Marvia grinned, not happily. “How many bodies does it take to make the case? How many have there been now, five, six?”

“Five.”

“And you’re sure they’re the work of one killer?”

Dorothy Yamura shook her head. She wore civilian clothes, the dress-for-success look. With her glossy hair pulled behind her head and her thin northern Japanese features, she looked like a bank executive or the newest partner in a major California law firm. She did not look like a cop.

Neither did Marvia Plum—or she would not have, to an observer from an earlier era. But in this age, a black female in a smart, form-fitting police sergeant’s uniform did not draw the stares and comments she once would have.

“We called in our tame consultant from the University,” Yamura explained. “These murders have some of the earmarks of the classic serial killer. But others are missing. In fact, some of the signs point straight away from a serial killer. Some of them make me wonder if they’re even connected.”

She extended a slim, meticulously manicured hand and tapped a glossy fingernail on the top folder on her desk. “Look at these, Marvia. How familiar are you with this series?”

“I’ve followed them. Remember, Telegraph Avenue was my old beat. I’ve had enough cases that centered there. It’s kind of a hobby, now, following the incident reports and the stats. Everybody knows this town would be a dead duck if the Telegraph merchants had to close up and move away. But every time we try and get a handle on the crime there, you’d think we were trying to repeal the Bill of Rights.”

Now it was Dorothy Yamura’s turn to grin wryly. “That’s why I want to pull all these cases together. We’re going to work on the notion that they are connected. If they are, if we’re right and we can figure out what’s going on and catch the perp, we can get a major bad guy off the streets and stop these killings. If we’re wrong…well, we can still tackle the cases one by one and solve them that way. Like the Twelve-Step people say, One day at a time.”

Marvia Plum nodded. “One murder at a time.”

“Okay.” Yamura seemed relieved. “What’s your plan?”

Plum pulled the stack of folders toward herself. They slid smoothly on the polished glass on top of Yamura’s desk. “I have to study these, of course. And I want to talk to your pet big-dome, and to the people who are bringing the pressure.”

“Sounds good to me. Okay, jot this down. Consultant at UC is Martha Rachel Bernstein, Ph.D. Here’s her phone number. And Mistress Moonflower, she runs that shop called Woodstock West on the avenue.”

“I know it well. And I know Mistress Moonflower.” Marvia Plum made a sour face.

“Yes. Moonflower’s after us to solve these murders. Says that the publicity is killing trade. Half of her customers are fourteen-year-old kids from Walnut Creek who think it’s daring to take the train into Berkeley and buy black light posters and rolling papers and take them home with them. Now all the mommies and daddies are cracking down on their little darlings and Woodstock West is losing money.”

“Moonflower has no other ax to grind?”

Dorothy Yamura gave her little, breathy laugh. She seemed reluctant to let the laughter out except in tiny, rationed bursts. “Woodstock West got hit by a burglar or burglars. You must have read the report. Or at least seen it on the news. Channel Two loved it. I think there was even a little network pickup.”

“Oh, yes. Jimi Hendrix’s guitar. The very one he used at the Monterey Pops in the Summer of Love. I did see the footage. That was the one he poured lighter fluid all over and set fire to.”

“Yes. That was considered art in 1967. The Who smashed ’em up and Jimi set ’em on fire.” She got a faraway look. Marvia wondered where Dorothy Yamura had been in 1967 but there were some things that a sergeant did not ask a lieutenant. Even if they were friends.

Marvia Plum stood up and hefted the stack of folders in her arms. She started to leave Dorothy Yamura’s office.

“Oh, one more thing.” Plum turned back. “You know Councilmember Hanson?”

“Sherry Hanson? Sure. Never met a cop she didn’t hate.”

“Right. Well, she’s interested in this case.”

“Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

“She’s been burning up the phone lines. She says this is a conspiracy between the business interests and the Fascist police to ethnic-cleanse Berkeley.”

“Ethnic cleansing? What does that have to do with it?”

“Her phrase, Marvia. You better call her up, or better yet go see her at City Hall. At least she can’t say it’s a white male conspiracy.”

“No, her favorite line is that I’ve sold out both my race and my sex.”

Yamura waved her hand. “Do your best, Marvia. Just do your best.” She ran her long graceful fingers through her long, glossy hair. “Oh, I meant to tell you. Sally O’Hara sends her love.”

Marvia grinned. Sally O’Hara was the old lieutenant’s daughter. She’d refused to join the Berkeley force. Didn’t want to ride her daddy’s coattails. So she’d joined the Chicago PD. She was a rising star in that city, and when her father retired he’d gone to live with her.

“What’s new with Sally?”

“Just made detective. I’ve been keeping her posted on these killings, just for old times’ sake.”

Marvia Plum left Yamura’s office, made her way to her own desk and started through the manila folders. So Yamura was keeping Sally O’Hara posted just for old times’ sake. Marvia believed that as much as she believed that the check was in the mail.

She would visit both Mistress Moonflower and Councilmember Hanson, and it might be a good idea to have a chat with Professor Bernstein, too. But first, she needed to review the case—or cases—to date.

There had been five fatalities. Marvia looked for a pattern; she knew that, if you could find something in common among a series of crime victims, you had taken your first step toward finding the criminal. She made a set of file cards, one for each subject, filling in the victim’s name, race, sex, age, and other details. There was a mug-shot of each victim in the folder, some from older files, some clearly made in the county morgue; she carried the pictures to the photocopier and made copies of them, attaching one to each file card.

OTTO TIMMINS, 45, wm, USN Vietnam vet, chronic alcoholic, multiple arrests for harassing patrons of local cafés & restaurants. Body found in dumpster, shot in back of neck w/.22 cal. pistol.

LATONIA JONES, 11, bf, homeless, elementary school dropout, professional lookout and runner for known crack dealers. Collapsed on sidewalk in front of Gene’s Jeans, taken to County Hospital, died of combination drug overdose and poisoning (heroin contaminated with strychnine).

BILL SZYMANSKI, 26, wm, and ROBIN “MAINMAN” CAMPBELL, 31, bm. Both killed by single shotgun blast while naked together in sleeping bag in People’s Park. Witnesses describe “big, bearded guy who roared like an animal” leaving scene with shotgun. No other details due to darkness.

IMACULATA MARTINEZ, 66, lf, found in restroom of What’s Flat and Round with a Hole in the Middle, multiple stab wounds. Was seen entering restroom with another woman, both dressed in multiple layers of rags. (What’s Flat and Round with a Hole in the Middle is leading Telegraph Avenue record store.)

Marvia laid out the cards like a poker hand and studied them. Three males, two females. Two of the males were gay. One of the females was a drug abuser. Ages ranged from 11 to 66. Two white males, one black male, one black female, one Latina female. Two shotgunned, one poisoned, one stabbed, one shot with a pistol.

All were homeless, all hung out in People’s Park and/or the Telegraph Avenue area.

What in the world did that add up to?

Marvia went to the locker room and changed from her sergeant’s blues into a set of neat but casual civvies—jeans, a plaid button-up shirt, a light cloth jacket. The jacket concealed both her badge and her service revolver. She wasn’t exactly going undercover—in fact, she wasn’t going undercover at all—but she didn’t want to flaunt her presence by poking around in uniform.

Her first stop was Woodstock West.

She stepped from the bright sunlight and midday bustle of Telegraph Avenue into a very different, very special zone. The interior of the shop was dimly lighted, with Indian-print drapes filtering out most of the sunlight. The air was almost tangible in its thickness. She could almost feel the slowly rising incense on her tongue, it was so thick.

Black light posters covered the walls. There were astronomical scenes, nudes, drawings of cannabis plants, mind-twisting M.C. Escher prints, reproductions of Fillmore Ballroom posters. An oil portrait of Jimi Hendrix dominated one wall.

Mistress Moonflower was behind the glass counter, selling rolling papers to a couple of UC freshwomen who had their arms against each other. The shorter of the two customers snuggled her head into the shoulder of the taller. The taller customer looked over her shoulder and smiled down at Marvia. Sure, sweetie-pie, Marvia thought. Black or white, straight or gay, sisterhood is strong. You bet.

Mistress Moonflower recognized Marvia and nodded.

Marvia said, “I need to talk to you, Myrna.”

Mistress Moonflower frowned and turned toward the back of the store. “Star Lotus, front.”

A younger, beefier version of Mistress Moonflower emerged through a wall of hanging prints. Mistress Moonflower led Marvia into a cramped office-cum-stock room. Moonflower wore a kerchief woven through her curly black hair, a filmy blouse and billowing skirt. The blouse was open to her sternum. An eye-of-god was visible, tattooed between her breasts. She was barefoot and wore an anklet with a tinkling bell.

She said, “My name is Moonflower.”

Marvia bit her lower lip. “Your business permit says Myrna Gersh.”

Mistress Moonflower shook her head. “I left Myrna Gersh behind years ago. Threw her off a mountain in Nepal.”

“Yeah, right. They ever find the body?”

“We shared this body. That day Myrna Gersh left the plane and I was born, Mistress Moonflower.”

“Okay. What do you know about the series of murders in the Telegraph area?”

“The Tallyman.”

“What?”

“The Tallyman. He appears, he takes his tally and he disappears. That’s what we call him now. The Tallyman.”

“Lieutenant Yamura says that you represent the local merchants.”

“Unofficially.”

“Are you concerned?”

“We’re frightened.”

“The Tallyman going after storekeepers? Shoppers? Students?”

“You never know who’s next.”

Marvia reached into a jacket pocket and laid out her victim cards. “What do you make of these?”

The curtains parted and Star Lotus stuck her head into the back room. Mistress Moonflower hissed, “Stay out there. Wait on customers. Make yourself useful.”

Star Lotus withdrew.

“Look, we were hit, Officer. I mean, Woodstock West was hit. I don’t know if the Tallyman did it, or somebody else, but we need protection from the police, not harassment.”

“I know, Jimi Hendrix’s guitar. Totally burned, beyond repair.”

“It was a holy relic. If we could only recover it.…”

“Right. It’s practically the Shroud of Turin. Look, I want you to look at these cards and photos and tell me if you knew any of these people.”

Mistress Moonflower looked at the cards and the photos. She looked up at Marvia and shrugged. “Sure, I knew them.”

“All of them?”

“They were all Telly regulars. Panhandlers, street people. Sometimes they’d come into the store and demand money. Sometimes they’d want to use the back room. I never let them. When they pestered my customers I’d shoo them out. Call the cops if I had to. Lot of help that was, they always knew how long it would take the fuzz to arrive and split just in the nick of time.”

The fuzz, Marvia thought. Marvia Plum, Sergeant Fuzz.

“Who killed them?”

“They’re all dead, aren’t they?”

“Who killed them?”

“How the hell should I know? The Tallyman did it.”

“Who’s the Tallyman?”

Mistress Moonflower shrugged. One breast popped halfway out of her shirt. She said, “Oops,” and readjusted herself.

Marvia Plum started for the curtain that would bring her back into the storefront. She could hear customers talking with Star Lotus. It sounded as if Star Lotus was making a big sale. Marvia stopped and inquired, “I’m curious, Myrna. How’s business lately?”

Mistress Moonflower shrugged a little more carefully. “’Bout the same as ever.”

“Tallyman isn’t scaring your customers off, then?”

“’Bout the same as ever.”

Marvia crossed Telegraph and headed down the block toward People’s Park. She strolled along the sidewalk, not entering the park. She turned back toward the campus and stood in front of a sorority house. In five minutes one of her park snitches showed up.

“I saw you walk past the park. I could use a little bread.”

Lawsamarcy! Use a little bread. “What do you have for me?”

“I don’t know. Ask me a question.”

“Who’s the Tallyman?”

The snitch was wearing a ragged tube-top and sweat pants. Between them, her belly showed. It was smudged with ordinary dirt and a little of what seemed to be dried mustard. She wore a navel-ring from which a silver chain and crucifix dangled over the top of her pants. She said, “Don’t ask me that.”

“You followed me, Vangie.”

“I know. Ask me something else.”

“What do you know about Latonia Jones?”

Despite the bright sunlight, Vangie shivered. “A lot of people didn’t like her. She worked for some crack dealers. They’d show up generally around dusk, you know, when we get our campfires started, and she’d play lookout for them. In case the pigs were coming. Pardon me, Sergeant.”

“Yeah. Why didn’t they like her?”

“You know.” Vangie twisted her torso and flung her hair off her face. Marvia jerked away.

“I don’t know. That’s why I asked you.”

“You know. Uh, well, you know, there are some moms in the park. They don’t want their brats getting hooked. You know, Latonia kind of, well, recruited. Users, hookers. Sometimes guys come by the park in cars, especially at night. They like little kids, girls or boys.”

“Vangie, who killed Latonia?”

“I dunno. The Tallyman. Can I have some bread?”

“You’ll have to do better than that. You haven’t given me anything I don’t already know.” Marvia Plum turned away and started toward the UC campus.

She felt Vangie’s hand on her shoulder. She wasn’t surprised. “Somebody saw Latonia just before—before. It was just about sundown. Some big car pulled up by the park. She went over. I saw her lean in, then come out with something.”

“Come on, Vangie. Something—what?”

“I don’t know. I guess it was a needle.”

“And she shot up and died. And somebody stole the needle and used it again, probably.” Almost certainly. The needle had never been found. But there were no more strychnine deaths, so whoever took it had apparently had the brains to rinse it out, at least.

“What kind of car?”

“Big. Foreign. I don’t know.”

“What color was it?”

“White.”

“Japanese? German? American?”

“I don’t know. One of those English cars, I think.”

“A Rolls?”

“No. I think they call it a Jagger or something.”

“Who was driving?”

“I couldn’t see.”

“Try and remember something. Man or woman?”

“I don’t know.” Marvia turned away. Again, the hand. “A woman.”

“Age? Black or white?”

“No age, any age. White.”

“That’s all? What next?”

“She drove away, that’s all. I didn’t follow her, for God’s sake.”

Marvia Plum handed her a folded bill and Vangie trotted away, back toward the park.

Marvia headed for City Hall. She found Councilmember Hanson in her office.

“I came to talk about the Tallyman.”

“The who?”

“They’re calling the Telly killer the Tallyman. I heard it in one of the shops and again at People’s Park.”

“Wonderful. Police Department’s paying some attention at last, are they? I roasted the chief enough.”

“Lieutenant Yamura assigned me the case, Councilmember Hanson.”

“You can call me Sherry, sister. We’re all sisters.”

“No we aren’t.”

Councilmember Hanson looked angry. “I should have known. I checked up on your background. You were in the army. You were a cop there too. What is it you like, carrying a gun around? Wearing a uniform?”

“I’m not wearing one now.”

“What have you learned?”

“I report to Lieutenant Yamura. You can get your information from her.”

“Sergeant, you’re in the Berkeley Police Department, not the Gestapo. I want to know what you’ve learned.”

Marvia counted to ten. “All I’ve got is a list of victims and a name. The Tallyman. He could be anybody.” There was the hulking figure who walked away from Bill Szymanski and Robin Campbell’s sleeping bag. She didn’t know about the woman who entered the restroom with Imaculata Martinez, or the woman in the white Jagger—it must be a Jaguar—who gave the needle to Latonia Jones. If Hanson didn’t know all that, it was just as well.

“I want regular reports on this matter,” the councilmember was saying. “These are people of color, they’re poor people, they’re the victims of society, and now they’re being murdered.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“They’re your people, Marvia.” She smiled. “What about that little Jones girl?”

“The crack dealer’s lookout?”

“That child needed help, Marvia.”

“She got a lot of that, didn’t she, Councilmember? I have an appointment.”

Marvia Plum phoned Dr. Martha Rachel Bernstein at the university, ascertained that she would be in her office for the next hour, arranged to go see her. She left her car at police headquarters and walked to the campus. There seemed to be more street vendors than ever. Business was booming. The customers didn’t even look grubby today—a combination of student types, workers on their breaks, shoppers. There were even some parents with small children in tow, apparently in from the suburbs for a day in Berkeley. Marvia Plum hadn’t seen much of that in years.

Martha Rachel Bernstein, Ph.D. was short and heavyset, more muscular than fleshy. Her office overlooked Bancroft Way and Telegraph Avenue. She peered up through thick bifocals when Marvia Plum stood in her doorway and said, “Met you before, Sergeant. Remember that case with the stolen Duesenberg phaeton?”

Marvia said, “I surely do. But I’d forgot that we worked on that one.”

“Okay. I guess white people all look the same anyhow. You want to talk about the Tallyman.”

“You know about that. I seem to be the only one who hasn’t known that name all along.”

“Lieutenant Yamura sent me the information on these killings. Five victims. I’m a sociologist, you know, not a psychologist.”

“Aren’t they pretty close?”

“Sometimes. Anyway—hey, why are you standing there like you might run away any second, come on in and close the door and sit down. Isn’t this a palace?”

Marvia complied.

“I studied the victims’ profiles. Also had an interesting talk with my friend, Dr. Chih.”

“I don’t know—”

“Chih Yuan. Good friend of mine. Looks at the relationship of sociology and economics. Effect of family constellations on crime stats and vice versa. Smart woman. Brilliant woman. Taiwanese.”

“Chinese?”

“Taiwanese. Hates Chinese. Says that Taiwan is a colony.”

Marvia shifted in her chair. “Look, Doctor—”

“Martha.”

“I’m not really interested in whether Taiwan is a colony of China or China’s a colony of Taiwan. I’ve got five murders here.”

“Don’t sneer at Dr. Chih’s work.”

“I don’t mean to sneer at her work. But I’m concerned with my own work. It looks as if we’ve got a serial killer loose, only we’re not even sure of that. Maybe I really am in the wrong department. Maybe we should get a shrink.”

“I want her to join us.” Martha Bernstein reached for the telephone. When Marvia Plum didn’t object, she punched another extension and muttered into the mouthpiece. Moments later Dr. Chih swept into Bernstein’s office. Bernstein introduced her and Marvia Plum.

Dr. Chih flung herself into a vacant chair. She sprawled with her feet in front of her. She wore her hair in a crew cut; she looked as if a giant fuzzy black caterpillar had chosen her for best friend. She wore a black tee-shirt with a larger-than-life-size portrait of Marilyn Monroe on the chest. She wore tight jeans and white, low-top sneakers.

She gave Marvia Plum a look. “Rache says you’re interested in these murders. The boys in the bag and those others.”

“I am.”

“Why?”

Marvia nearly let go a giggle. “It’s my job, Dr. Chih. I’m a cop. We catch murderers.”

“Why?”

Marvia shook her head. “Don’t ask me to philosophize. We have laws, we have cops to enforce the laws, we have more cops who try to catch people who break the laws. After that it’s up to the DA and the judge and the whole rest of the system.”

Dr. Chih had closed her eyes during Marvia Plum’s response. When Marvia finished, she opened her eyes again and said, “You don’t have any theory about morality or the social contract or repairing rents in the fabric of civilization?”

“I’m just doing my job.”

“Because the Berkeley Voice and the Oakland Trib have been carrying on about how this town is losing its collective conscience, and besides the local merchants are losing business hand over fist because people are scared to come into town.”

“I’ve heard that.”

Dr. Chih grinned. Her teeth were big and very white. “You see, I’m interested in the economic effects of social change. And a funny thing’s been happening. The papers are wrong. The local merchants are prospering. Every time one of these troubled souls is removed violently from our midst, there’s a momentary scare, and then local business goes up. Do you think that’s odd?”

“I noticed it myself. On my way over here.”

“Ah-hah.”

“But where do we go from there? Do you think it would be a good thing to let these murders continue?”

“I’m a social scientist, not a moralist. I observe and report, and I try to understand. I don’t judge.”

Marvia swung in her chair. “Dr. Bernstein, what’s your take?”

“How?”

“Any idea who’s doing the killings? Based on what you know about the victims?”

Bernstein tapped a yellow pencil on the edge of an old, smoked-glass ashtray on the corner of her desk. Marvia saw a sealed brown package in the ashtray. Philip Morris cigarettes. How long had they been there?

“It’s somebody who knows the Telegraph area well. Maybe somebody who lives here, or has lived here.”

“Motive?”

“You sure you want me and not a shrink?”

“Go for it, Doctor.”

“I think it’s political. Or moral. Maybe even religious.”

Dr. Chih asked a question. “Why do people kill people, Sergeant Plum? You deal with it every day. I only read murder mysteries, and I like the old-fashioned kind where the wicked nephew poisons the wealthy uncle so he can marry the beautiful adventuress.”

Marvia nodded. “Yes. People murder for money. There was that case in San Francisco where a couple of smart cookies were marrying rich old men with coronary problems and overdosing them with their own heart medicine. And of course those sweet brothers in LA who shotgunned Mommy and Daddy for their millions.”

“My point exactly.” Dr. Chih shifted her weight and crossed her ankles. “These people had nothing. They were down-and-outers, sleeping in the park.”

“Well, we have turf wars. The crack dealers have brought back the old Al Capone style drive-by’s. And there’s the hold-up artist who panics and shoots the convenience store clerk. Sometimes a handful of customers for good measure. And the disgruntled worker who takes a Tek-9 back to the office and blows away half the staff.” Marvia Plum shook her head. “It’s a sorry business.”

Dr. Bernstein tapped her ashtray for attention. Marvia guessed it was her habit. “Don’t forget domestic violence.”

Marvia said, “I don’t.” After a moment of silence she added, “But none of these account for Otto Timmins and Imaculata Martinez and the rest of my folks.” Her file cards and photos were still spread on Dr. Bernstein’s desk. She pressed them down with her fingertips, slid them around like a slick dealer.

Dr. Bernstein said, “What if you have more than one killer?”

“Why would you think that?”

“Dr. Chih’s notion of a religious vendetta.”

“That info I don’t have. And that’s something we’ve avoided, at least. We don’t have Catholics and Protestants killing each other, or Muslims and Jews.”

Dr. Chih pushed herself upright in her seat. “That is not what I meant by religious. I meant, someone who resents the lifestyle of these people.”

Marvia was surprised by that suggestion. “Who would envy these lost souls? An alcoholic ex-sailor, an eleven-year-old crack lookout, a 66-year-old bag lady, and a pair of gay lovers reduced to sharing a sleeping bag in People’s Park. Who could envy them?”

“No, I did not say envy.” Dr. Chih sat straighter still. Marvia Plum realized that she was quite tall, with square shoulders and a slim body. “I said, resent. Resentment and envy are similar but they are not identical. I agree with you, it would be hard to find anyone who envied these homeless souls. But think of someone whose whole lifestyle and livelihood is tied to more conventional values. Someone who feels constricted by a job with regular hours, oppressed by taxes and rent bills and license fees and all the other impedimenta of modern urban life.”

“Okay,” Marvia nodded. “And that person is maybe on her way home from a hard day’s work—”

“Or maybe she’s running an errand on her lunch break,” Dr. Bernstein put in.

“Or maybe.…” Dr. Chih stood and crossed to Martha Rachel Bernstein’s single, small window. “…she just looks out the window and she sees the contrast between the hardworking little worker bees like herself, and the lazy, sybaritic drones lounging in the park or panhandling on the avenue—”

“And suppose a group of such like-minded, hardworking, law-abiding, productive, decent citizens banded together and decided that some of these people weren’t really the victims of society that good progressive Berkeley likes to think they are. Suppose these good people decided that they were dealing with parasites, with individuals who would rather lay about all day, soak themselves in liquor or drugs, disrupt commerce, frighten mothers and children out of town, ruin the business of hardworking shopkeepers.…” Dr. Bernstein looked at her watch. “I’m so sorry, Sergeant Plum, I have a class in ten minutes. I’ll have to chase you out of my office now.”

Dr. Bernstein rested her hands on her desk and hoisted herself to her full height.

Marvia stood up. “Wait a minute. Don’t run off so quick.”

Bernstein shook her head. “My students are waiting. You can walk with me if you wish.”

Dr. Bernstein, Dr. Chih and Marvia Plum started down the hallway. Bulletin boards were covered with want ads, course offerings, cut-rate travel offers.

Marvia raised her hands in front of her shoulders. “Are you saying that a kind of—religious, quasi-religious cult is killing these people?”

“I don’t know. But the different ways they died, the different suspicious figures who were reported afterwards—what does your police training tell you?”

“Huh! The patterns are different. Serials generally adopt a pet method and stick with it. Even professional hitters are usually self-consistent. We’ve had four incidents, five deaths, a different method each time.”

“Here’s my session. Feel free at any time.” Dr. Bernstein shook Marvia’s hand and disappeared into a crowded classroom. Dr. Chih shook Marvia’s hand and headed off on a mission of her own.

Marvia walked south on Telegraph for a few blocks before heading west to police headquarters. The sun was sinking low and traffic was heavy. As Marvia neared People’s Park she thought, This is the time of day when they come out to play. The campfires will be burning, the crazies will be raving and the drug dealers will be making a fortune.

It was also the time of day that squatters would be marking their territory in doorways and storefronts, setting up their little encampments and harassing shoppers foolish enough to stay on the avenue after dark.

But the avenue seemed more peaceful than usual for this hour. More shoppers remained on the streets, the cafés were brightly lit and crowded with students drinking coffee or beer, stores were staying open after dark again and they bustled with customers. Marvia wondered, Where have all the loonies gone?

She checked her watch as she started up the steps at headquarters. She hadn’t been authorized any overtime for this job, and Lieutenant Yamura was a stickler for staying within budget.

There was a note on Marvia’s desk. Phone me at home, DY. She punched Dorothy Yamura’s private number.

“I had a call from Sally O’Hara in Chicago. They busted Parker Tice.”

“They have anything they can make stick?” Tice, Marvia Plum knew, was a top-flight hitter. Arrested many times, never convicted of anything worse than a couple of petty youth offenses.

“There was an Illinois warrant, I think they’re going to squeeze hard this time. But that’s up to the DA out there. But get this—Tice had an airline stub for a return flight from Oakland last Friday AM.”

“And Szymanski and Campbell got it Thursday night. And Tice is a shotgun specialist.”

“You got it.” Yamura spoke with a smile in her voice.

“You want me to fly out there?”

“Maybe later on. Not yet. Tice hates to talk to anybody, you know that. And we can’t do anything on the strength of an airline stub. Keep working this end. This was just something I wanted you to know.”

Marvia hung up the phone and climbed into bed. She wasn’t sure whether the phone rang just before or just after she had closed her eyes. It was Dorothy Yamura calling back.

“You’re not going to believe this.”

“Unh?”

“Fredi Muhammad’s dead.”

“Fredi? Feelgood Fredi, the biggest female dealer in the world of dope?”

“That’s the one. And get this—she was sampling her own wares. I thought she was too smart for that, only the bottom-rungers do that. But she must have made a mistake, and it looks like the same stuff that killed Latonia Jones.”

Marvia burrowed into her pillow, but the phone was still at her ear. “Marvia?”

“Super-intense smack laced with strychnine?”

“You think it was an accident? Or was somebody out to get Fredi?”

“I don’t know, Marvia. Sweet dreams, sweetie. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

* * * *

In the morning, Marvia worked Telegraph again. She wore her uniform, gun and badge on display. Some citizens stood and gaped at her, others gave her a wide berth. Passing Woodstock West, she saw both Mistress Moonflower and Star Lotus inside the store. They wore similar outfits: filmy blouses and billowy skirts. Both were barefoot and wore jingling anklets. Moonflower was berating Star Lotus over something.

At the A-to-Z 24-Hour Market a mile south of campus, Marvia got lucky. A clerk remembered Otto Timmins. “Poor old rummy,” was the way she put it. “Never stopped talking about the navy. What war was he in, I guess Vietnam. Yeah, he used to talk about the Gulf of Tonkin and cruising on the Mekong Delta.”

“Why would anybody kill Timmins?” Marvia asked.

“Well, he was kind of obnoxious. I just felt sorry for him. But he smelled bad and he used to collar people with his war stories and then ask them for money. If they didn’t give it to him he could get really hostile. Sometimes even if they did.”

“Just that?”

“And he used to scare children. He told me he loved them, but he used to lurch over and want to pet them or hug them and they’d scream and their mothers would hustle them out of his way. Manager made me bar him from the store but he just hung around outside panhandling and driving away customers. She said she didn’t want to do it either, but the owner made her. You know, Cora Kelly? Big time real-estate operator, she owns a lot of places and has other people managing them for her. But I felt sorry for the guy. Poor old guy.”

Marvia laid a bill on the counter. “Give me a cup of coffee, hey? Nice and hot.”

The clerk complied.

“When was the last time you saw Otto?”

“Well, it was the day before he was murdered. That’s why I remember it. It was—” She turned to a calendar with a picture of a female rock-climber perched triumphantly on top of Half Dome in Yosemite. The picture hung just below a big display clock with an advertising logo on it. The logo featured a blue dolphin drinking a stein of beer. “—see, I pulled the graveyard shift that night, and I got home and climbed into bed and turned on the radio and there it was on the early morning news. So I thought, poor old Otto, poor old guy. I know a lot of people figured, good riddance, but I thought, poor old guy.”

“What time did you see him, the day he was killed? Was he alone? Did he say or do anything you thought was unusual?”

“I remember there was a customer here, he started hassling her for money and I was going to throw him out but she made a gesture with her hand, like this, you know, like, it’s okay, so I backed off.”

“What did she look like?”

“Slim build, sharp features, nice figure for an older woman. You know, slim, must be good genes, huh, look at me and I must be half her age.”

“Right. What else? Distinguishing marks, hair, clothing?”

“It was a chilly day. She was wearing a quilted vest, I remember that. And her hair—looked like steel wool. I never saw hair like that before. Must feel really interesting. Kind of a turn-on.”

“Anything else? What did they do? What did they say to each other? Did they leave together?”

“That’s it. He asked her for money and she stopped and looked at him, I remember that. I mean, people didn’t like to look at Otto. He was a little too weird, you know? Just—not nice, that’s all. But this woman looked at him, and she leaned over and said something in his ear, and she walked out of the store. And Otto stood there, I remember, looking at the clock and moving his lips, like he was counting the time. Then he grunted something like, ‘Okay, it’s time,’ and he went out of the store.”

Marvia sat on a bench outside the A-to-Z making notes in her pocket notebook. The woman with steel-wool hair…that hair was Ceejay Harker’s trademark. And Ceejay was one of the country’s top female hitters. No, that wasn’t it. She was one of the country’s top hitters, gender of no concern. She was a woman of a certain age—the records disagreed on what that age was—and she stood at the top of her field.

Had Parker Tice shotgunned Bill Szymanski and Robin Campbell, and Ceejay Harker put a .22 slug into the base of Otto Timmins’ skull? Two top hitters for two trash-level hits? Did that make sense? But if that was the case, then what about Latonia Jones and Fredi Muhammad? Was that just a coincidence, or was that killing—make it those killings, now—connected with the Szymanski-Campbell and Timmins incidents?

Maybe it was just a coincidence, but Dorothy Yamura was famous for her dislike of coincidences. They made her nervous, she said, and she drilled it into her subordinates not to trust coincidence, but to look for the underlying connection.

Marvia Plum walked back on Telegraph. Near Woodstock West she ran into Star Lotus. The young woman was in tears. When she spotted Marvia she started to turn away, then spun around—Marvia could see she was wearing low-top boots, at least she wasn’t walking the street barefoot—and ran toward Marvia.

She was running past Marvia when Marvia reached out and caught her by the arms. “What’s the matter? What happened?”

Star Lotus looked at Marvia and shook her head. Her cheeks were wet. The smell of too-sweet incense came off her clothing, mixed with the sharpness of cannabis and the reek of hashish. “That—that—she fired me.”

“Why?” Marvia frowned.

“I can’t tell you.”

“Sure you can.” Marvia put her arm around Star Lotus’s shoulders. “Come on, we’ll find someplace quiet. You can talk to me.” So now I’m a social worker, she thought. Or maybe an employment counselor. Well, all in a day’s work.

Caffe Brasil was jammed to the gills, but Marvia Plum’s uniform helped them find a table. The customers were a mix of older students, faculty, working people and shoppers. A few stared at Marvia’s uniform. She ignored them. She was used to it. When the waiter arrived Star Lotus asked for a glass of wine. The waiter looked at Marvia, then asked Star Lotus for ID. She fumbled for a wallet and showed a card. The waiter nodded, looking sheepish. “I have to ask. Joanna’s a real stickler for that. You know, Joanna Moreira, the owner.”

Marvia said, “Cappuccino.” If she didn’t die of caffeine poisoning, she was certainly living by it.

“I wouldn’t do what she told me,” Star Lotus said. Her glass of wine had arrived and to Marvia Plum’s amazement she’d chug-a-lugged it. She looked around frantically, caught the waiter’s eye and waved her empty glass. The waiter disappeared to get her another.

“Take it easy,” Marvia suggested. “Did you eat today? Are you drinking that stuff on an empty stomach?”

“I don’t care.” By the time they entered the café, Star Lotus had stopped crying but now she started again. She used a napkin to dab her eyes and wipe her cheeks. The tears had made tracks there in her makeup. Marvia could see that, under the makeup, she had a serious complexion problem.

Marvia sipped her cappuccino. “You wouldn’t do what Mistress Moonflower wanted, so she fired you?”

Star Lotus nodded. The waiter set her second glass of wine on the table in front of her with one hand, removing the empty with the other. Star Lotus picked up the second glass and took a big sip, but at least she didn’t finish the glass this time. “The—the—I shouldn’t have done it the first time.”

“What did she want you to do?”

“You remember that old lady, that Imaculata?”

“Imaculata Martinez. She the one?”

“She used to sell things to us. Try and sell them. Just junk. She was a trash picker, you know. She used to find things in the trash, broken earrings, junk, you know. And she’d try and sell them to us. At first we used to give her a little money, I felt sorry for her, I guess Moonflower did too. We’d give her a little money for the things she brought in and then we’d throw them away.”

She paused and took another slug of wine.

“Moonflower got tired of it after a while and told her not to come around any more, she was bothering the customers. You know, most of our customers are young kids, they’re embarrassed to be in the store buying incense and rolling papers and condoms and things. And they didn’t like being around Imaculata, so they’d go to another store or whatever. But she kept coming around anyhow, and Moonflower told me—”

Marvia grabbed Star Lotus’s wrist. “Stop!”

Star Lotus jumped. “What’s the matter?”

“Don’t say another word. Listen here.” She unbuttoned the pocket on her uniform shirt and pulled out a Miranda card. She read the lines to Star Lotus. She knew the Miranda warning by heart, but Dorothy Yamura insisted that her people read it anyhow, every time, just to be safe. When she finished she said, “I want you to come with me.”

Star Lotus said, “Where? Don’t make me go back. I’m afraid of her, I don’t want to go back there.”

“To Woodstock West? We’re not going there.”

“Where are we going?”

“Are you carrying a concealed weapon?” Star Lotus shook her head. “Do you want to walk? I’ll call for a unit if you want. Would you rather ride?”

“Ride? Wha—?”

“Will you go with me to police headquarters, Star Lotus? Will you go voluntarily and talk with me there?”

Star Lotus stood up. Marvia Plum dropped another bill on the table. She took Star Lotus by one wrist. She didn’t handcuff her. She started away from the table, Star Lotus in tow. Star Lotus picked up her half-full glass of wine and emptied it before they reached the door. She placed it on the shelf just inside the door before following Marvia Plum back onto Telegraph.

At police headquarters Marvia Plum put Star Lotus in an interrogation room, then fetched Dorothy Yamura. On the way back from Yamura’s office she briefed the lieutenant on Star Lotus’s statement at the cafe. Dorothy Yamura asked if Marvia had mirandized Star Lotus. Even though she had done so, Dorothy Yamura insisted on doing it again, with a tape running and in the presence of both a public defender and an assistant DA.

The PD advised Star Lotus to say nothing until they’d conferred in private, but Star Lotus insisted on telling her story. “She made me,” Star Lotus sobbed. “She said I had to do it.”

The assistant DA laid a sympathetic hand on Star Lotus’s hand. “Do what, dear? Made you do what?”

“She made me take that poor old lady, that Mrs. Martinez, over to What’s Flat and Round with a Hole in the Middle, you know, the big record store. She said I had to take her into the bathroom and stab her. It was the only way to get rid of her. She was ruining our business and we couldn’t get rid of her any other way. We called the police and sometimes they wouldn’t even come at all, and other times they’d say they couldn’t do anything, we were open to the public and she was a member of the public.”

“But I don’t understand,” the assistant DA put in. Star Lotus wiped her eyes and looked up at the woman. Marvia Plum thought, this assistant DA was really good. She was about to unleash the Please help me, dear, ploy, Marvia was certain.

“Please help me, dear,” the assistant DA said, “how could she make you kill someone? You did kill Mrs. Martinez, didn’t you?”

The PD was about to have a hissy-fit, but Star Lotus was clearly in the unburdening mode, and there was no stopping her now.

“I ran away from home. I didn’t have anything. I was getting into a lot of trouble, I knew it. I was hanging around with bad people. I lived in the park for a while myself. Strangers were coming on to me, you know, coming on to me. And everybody was either getting drunk or smoking crack or shooting up, and one person grabbed me one time and tried to take me away and sell me. Sell me!”

She stopped to catch her breath. She asked for a glass of water and Marvia Plum sent a uniform to get it for her.

The assistant DA said, “How did you meet Mistress Moonflower?”

Star Lotus squeezed her eyes shut as if she was looking inside herself for a memory. “I was panhandling. I went into Woodstock West to try and get some money, and she said she wouldn’t give me a handout but I could try out for a job there. She said I was really pretty, and people liked to buy things from you if you were pretty.”

She looked around at all the others, the assistant DA, the PD, Lieutenant Yamura and Sergeant Plum and the uniform who had returned with a glass of water. The uniform handed the glass to Star Lotus. She took it and said, “Thanks,” and took a deep drink and set the glass down in front of her. She wiped her eyes and swept her hair back from her face and licked her lips to give them a moist look.

“I am pretty, don’t you think? Everybody always says I’m pretty.”

The assistant DA said, “Yes, Star Lotus, you’re pretty. Is that your real name, Star Lotus? That isn’t your real name, is it?”

Star Lotus shook her head. “Moonflower changed my name. It used to be Anna Mae Jenkins. Moonflower said, if I was going to work at Woodstock West, I had to have the right kind of name, and wear the right kind of clothes, and act kind of—kind of like one of those old, uh, I think she called them hippie chicks. That’s what she said I had to be, a hippie chick.”

The assistant DA said, “How old are you, Anna Mae?”

“Twenty-one. I have ID. I showed it to the waiter at Caffe Brasil, didn’t I, Sergeant Plum? Right? It’s still right here, right?”

The assistant DA turned the card over. She squinted at it, turned it over again. “Nice job. How old are you really, Anna Mae?”

“I’m really—”

“Please, dear, we want to help you.”

The PD looked as if she was about to pop a blood vessel.

“I’m fifteen.” Beneath the bright interrogation-room light, Anna Mae Jenkins’ face took on a peculiar look; she might be fifteen or she might be twice that age. “I was always big for my age, and I matured early. There were always boys after me and I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t like it, but they always said, Yes, I really did like it, I didn’t know what I really liked. I got so confused. And my father used to—he used to—back in Tennessee, I’m originally from Tennessee, did you know that?”

She looked up and smiled, showing her teeth.

The assistant DA and the PD exchanged a few quiet words. Then the assistant DA said, “This is all wrong. This child belongs with the juvenile authorities, not here. My God, but she needs help.”

Dorothy Yamura said, “Come along, Anna Mae. You can sit in my office. You can wait there and we’ll get somebody to take you someplace safe.”

Anna Mae said, “Really?”

Dorothy Yamura nodded.

Anna Mae said, “Really safe? Really?“

“Really safe, Anna Mae.”

And a little later, Lieutenant Yamura talked with Sergeant Plum. “Marvia, I don’t know what to say. I should be furious, you let a 15-year-old child fool you into thinking she was 21. But she fooled me, so I guess I can’t be too hard on you.”

“I feel rotten about it.” Marvia put her fingertips against her temples and rubbed, trying to ease a sudden headache. “But I know what we have to do.”

“You bet. Back to Woodstock West. We’ve got a date with—what did you say Mistress Moonflower’s real name was?”

“Myrna Gersh.”

“Myrna Gersh.”

Mistress Moonflower had wasted no time in replacing Star Lotus. Marvia Plum went through the front door of Woodstock West while a couple of uniforms stationed themselves at the back door.

A new hippie chick was behind the counter, waiting on a customer while Mistress Moonflower supervised. The new hippie chick had long, glossy hair parted in the middle and hanging down the back of her floor-length, Hindu-patterned dress. She wore yellow-tinted, Janis Joplin glasses, a nose-ring, and brass bangles up one arm.

Incense rose from a hammered-brass burner on the glass counter, as if carrying prayers past the Jimi Hendrix icon on the wall behind.

The new hippie chick look startled when Marvia entered the shop, but Mistress Moonflower smiled her sour smile at Marvia and said, “Sergeant Plum, this is my new helper, Amber Glow.”

Marvia said, “Okay, Amber Glow, shoo the customer out and lock up. I’m afraid Woodstock West is closing. Myrna, you have the right to remain silent. You are not required to say anything.…”

Myrna Gersh’s first reaction was to brazen it out, but by the time the assistant DA had finished playing Anna Mae Jenkins’ tape for her she was willing to cut a deal. She wasn’t in it alone. Joanna Moreira, Cora Kelly, half the merchants on Telegraph Avenue were in it with her.

The drug dealers, the panhandlers, the crazies and the child molesters in the park, the doorway squatters and the sidewalk campers and the common thugs were destroying business on the avenue. They were ruining the town, and the town would pay an even greater price when its already slipping commercial tax base shrank to zero.

Then who would pay the police officers’ salaries?

Then who would pay for the politicians’ perks?

The government refused to clean up the city, the politicians practically invited vagrants and parasites to join the party.

The merchants had to act, and they had hired hitters, one by one, to come to town and removed the most flagrant nuisances. There was no one Tallyman. The Tallyman had been Parker Tice, he had been Ceejay Harker, he had been Fredi Muhammad. It was true that using poor bewildered Anna Mae Jenkins, a.k.a. Star Lotus, to remove Imaculata Martinez had been a serious mistake, but if they had it all to do over again.…

Within days, not only Myrna Gersh but half a dozen other entrepreneurs were in custody. The charges ranged from conspiracy to capital murder. Bail was denied to each defendant.

Two weeks later the assistant DA sat in Lieutenant Yamura’s office along with Sergeant Plum. The DA said, “I don’t know what we’re going to do about this. Have you been following the public reaction to the Tallyman case?”

Lieutenant Yamura closed the lid on a palmtop computer she’d been consulting and placed it carefully in a desk drawer. “You bet I have. Most of the editorials were on our side.”

“At first,” the assistant DA put in.

“At first, yes. Then the talk shows started going nuts all over the area. And the letter columns. Have you looked at the Oakland Trib lately, or the Berkeley Voice? Even the East Bay Express is starting to come around.”

“Come around against us, you mean.”

“That’s exactly what I mean.”

“There’s a Tallyman Society on the university campus. There are at least a dozen people going around town claiming to be the Tallyman, and everybody wants to buy ’em a meal or a drink. On my way over here today I saw four or five cars with Tallyman for Mayor bumper stickers, and one that said, Honk if you love the Tallyman and people were honking, believe me.”

“What are you going to do?” Dorothy Yamura asked.

The assistant DA shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. Maybe go for a change of venue.”

Marvia Plum asked, “Isn’t that usually a defense tactic?”

The DA nodded. “Usually, sister, that’s right. Usually.”

“I had a phone call from Dr. Chih this morning,” Marvia told the others. “She says that business is still up on the avenue. The crime rate is dropping. We know that, of course, as well as she does or better. A couple of businesses have closed up, but others are eager to move in. It looks as if Telly is turning around. At least, so Dr. Chih says.”

Dorothy Yamura turned to Marvia Plum. “I don’t want to keep you here longer than necessary, Sergeant. I know you have plenty of work to do.”

“I have,” Marvia Plum admitted. “I surely have.” She left the meeting and went back to her job.