Dead Egotistical Morons

by Mark Richard Zubro

  The offices were more spartan than Turner expected. A shabby old couch in a small entryway. The receptionist, one man sitting at a computer, a phone with five lines next to him. Piles of the magazine’s latest issues covered much of the floor in the anteroom area. The person at the entrance pressed a button and told Blundlefitz he had visitors.

  When the reporter saw the detectives, he gave them a thin smile. A short little man in a goatee accompanied Blundlefitz. He held out his hand. “I’m Marshall Rolt, the publisher and editor-in-chief of Hot Trends. You must be the detectives investigating the murders. Please come in.” Rolt was a fleshy man, maybe five-three with poundage on him that resembled a munchkin football linebacker gone to seed. He wore a pair of too large jeans, a white shirt, and a dark blue tie. He led them to a conference room. Turner assumed the offices must go back the length of the building. He saw only two other people working at computer terminals. Turner knew from Ian’s stories that most of the work on these smaller newspapers was done by stringers.

  The conference table was well-worn Formica. The chairs didn’t match. Clearly, the magazine’s money was not invested in amenities. There was an instant coffeemaker and a microwave oven. Each had a little sign on it reminding those who used them to clean up after themselves.

  Rolt said, “I’m sure we can come to some kind of understanding.”

  Fenwick said, “Your guy came to us Sunday morning with information that Jonathan Zawicki was screwing all the guys in the band. By late Sunday evening, he and Zawicki were orchestrating a campaign to blame the police and cover up any mention of sexual activity.”

  Rolt said, “Randy has explained everything to me. We at the magazine are interested in journalistic integrity.”

  “Telling lies and switching stories is integrity?” Fenwick asked.

  Rolt said, “We want to get to the truth. We’re willing to help put a murderer behind bars. We also don’t want to see innocent people suffer.”

  “You know Jonathan Zawicki is innocent?” Fenwick asked.

  “We’re going to follow wherever truth leads,” Rolt replied.

  “Your reporter took underwear from a dead young man,” Fenwick said. “Don’t you think that’s a little unusual?”

  “Randy was eager to get a story.”

  “Are you listening to yourself?” Fenwick asked. “To each of our questions, you’ve responded with illogic, nonsense, or non sequiturs.”

  Turner wished this was the first time in his career—not the ten zillionth—that he’d met such blind recalcitrance.

  Rolt said, “We are not the enemy of the police here. We’re a small magazine with a small staff. The music industry does pay for a lot of the ads in our paper, but that does not mean we are shills for them. We give honest reviews and do factual reporting. No one here knows anything about the murders. They are awful and tragic. We’re going to have a memorial edition.”

  “Are you exploiting these murders?” Fenwick asked.

  “We’re reporting the news,” Rolt said, “giving our readers what they’re interested in.”

  “I care that these young men are dead,” Blundlefitz said. “Is there a manual on how people are supposed to react? I know there are hundreds of crying teenagers out in the cold. I feel bad for them, but I have no personal stake in it. I didn’t know them. I’m interested in the news.”

  “Can you tell us what the latest is on the investigation?” Rolt asked. “Your replies would be strictly off-the-record.”

  To his credit Fenwick did not guffaw. He said, “We can’t discuss an open case. Perhaps Mr. Blundlefitz can check with Mr. Zawicki’s people and get some information for you.”

  “I’ve done that,” the reporter said, “and I’ll continue to do it.”

  “Mr. Blundlefitz,” Turner asked, “why did you change your point of view?”

  “I follow where the news leads, where the truth is. You gentlemen humiliated me. You tricked me. I should have brought the lawyers with me. My ego got in the way. That won’t happen again.”

  “You told us you had some notes from a meeting that talked about the band breaking up,” Turner said. “Where are those notes?”

  Rolt said, “If he has such notes, that would be privileged information.”

  “You can’t bully me now,” Blundlefitz said. “Maybe there were no notes.”

  “Maybe you’re an asshole,” Fenwick said.

  Rolt said, “Really, is it necessary to call names?”

  “Do you have Dexter’s diary?” Turner asked.

  “He kept a diary?” Blundlefitz asked. “I’d love to read it.”

  Turner got no sense whether this counter-question was a cover-up or a genuine expression of his lack of knowledge.

  “Who have you been talking to?” Fenwick asked.

  “I don’t have to respond to that,” Blundlefitz said. “The police have a terrible record.”

  “The media have written lots of stories about police corruption,” Turner said, “and I’m not going to say that improper behavior doesn’t happen, or that mistakes aren’t made, but how does that apply to this? Aren’t you having an extreme reaction?”

  Fenwick said, “He just wants to investigate so they sell more magazines, and he gets the glory for himself.”

  Rolt said, “We are very interested in cooperating with the police and in finding the murderer. At the same time we are not going to violate journalistic integrity.”

  They got absolutely nowhere with them.

  Turner and Fenwick walked down the wide hallway to the front. A man in his mid twenties left an office and followed them out to the elevator. He called, “I’ve got an interview,” to the receptionist, who barely nodded. After the elevator car arrived and all three of them entered, the new person said, “You didn’t get far with them, did you?”

  “Who are you?” Fenwick asked.

  “Ned Lummy. I work at the paper. I hate Randall Blundlefitz. I think Marshall Rolt is a shit.”

  “Why do you still work there?” Fenwick asked.

  “I like getting a paycheck. Cheers me up every week. Finding a job and not being a stringer at one of these papers isn’t easy. I think I might be able to give you some information.”

  The elevator door opened on the ground floor.

  “Where can we go to talk?” Lummy asked. “I don’t want to be seen around here with you guys if I can help it. It’s too cold out just to walk.”

  “Our car,” Turner said. “We can drive over to Lincoln Park. It certainly won’t be crowded at this time of the year, especially in this cold.”

  They sat fifty yards from Lake Shore Drive. The heater did its best to keep them from freezing, its best being barely adequate.

  Lummy said, “You guys have a crummy car. Can you turn the heat up?”

  “Not if we want the engine to keep working,” Fenwick said.

  Lummy sat in the back. The two detectives each leaned an elbow on top of the seat back and looked at him. Lummy rubbed his hands together, blew on them, then put his gloves back on. “I hate Blundlefitz. He lords it over everybody as if that crummy rag we work for is actually a real magazine. He’s a big nobody in a tiny pond. The receptionist called and told me the cops were here. It could only be about one thing. Did he really steal underwear from that dead kid?”

  “Yeah,” Fenwick said.

  “Sick. I know why he switched from anti-Zawicki to pro.”

  The detectives leaned forward.

  “Blundlefitz hates boy bands. He has never given one of them a good review, but he likes being close to celebrity, so he always hangs around the concerts. Zawicki has promised him access to every group at Riveting Records.”

  “Who told you this?” Fenwick asked.

  “Blundlefitz isn’t making a secret of it, at least not at the office. He’s bragging. And he’s really mad at you.”

  “We were told he talked to the magazine’s lawyers,” Turner said.

  “Ha! Lawyers? There’s only one. The guy consults for us
because he’s a buddy of Rolt’s. He’s really a corporate lawyer. He knows little about constitutional or any other kind of law. Blundlefitz uses him to make bluffs, but half the time when he says he’s talked to him, he hasn’t.”

  Turner realized that Blundlefitz must have talked to Zawicki’s lawyers sometime Sunday, presumably at the afternoon meeting.

  “Would Blundlefitz help keep the identity of the killer secret?” Turner asked.

  “I don’t think he knows who did it, but he thinks he’s going to solve the murder. Rolt’s pushing him to. I’ve never seen Blundlefitz’s fat ass move quicker. He has called in every marker he has. They think if they find out who the killer is before the police, they’ll make themselves into celebrities and catapult the magazine into national prominence. Ha! As if. Although Blundlefitz did get permission from Zawicki to talk to everybody connected to the band.”

  “What’s the background on Blundlefitz?” Turner asked

  “He’s been into music since he was a kid. He even had a band when he was a freshman in college. Called the Left-handed Masturbators. Everybody wants a name to get people’s attention. Their music might not be any good, but at least someone will notice.”

  “Was their music any good?” Fenwick asked.

  “I never heard them. Blundlefitz claimed they were great, but everybody says that.”

  “How come they never made a name for themselves, or at least, why did he drop out of the band?”

  “He never said. No one else around the office ever heard of the band that I know of. Ninety-nine-point-nine percent of the bands that start up go nowhere. I assumed their story was the same as most bands. They don’t make it for any number of reasons. They don’t want to put in the time. They find out what a struggle it is. Egos go out of control. Maybe people get bored. Or maybe it’s as simple as they aren’t any good. People quit bands and walk away for no reason. Some don’t want to commit as much as others. Lots of ordinary reasons.”

  Lummy didn’t know anything else. They dropped him off a block from the paper to lower the risk of him being seen getting out of their car.

  “I don’t get it,” Fenwick said. “Blundlefitz gets access and we don’t.”

  “Several possibilities,” Turner said. “Zawicki doesn’t think Blundlefitz will ever find out, or he thinks that if Blundlefitz does find out, he can control that information or do something about it. Use it to his own advantage. Remember, his main goal is profits. He can still sell a lot of CDs. Right now, I think this is more about control than cover-up. That could change real fast.”

  18

  They drank coffee, ate food, and indulged in witty cop banter at Harriet’s Rat Food Special Drive-in. Cops flocked to the place. It was in the warehouse district west of the Tribune plant on Chicago Avenue. No sign identified it as a place open to the public. All the parking in the area was illegal. Although it was called a drive-in there was in fact no place to drive in. If you weren’t a marked or unmarked cop car, you got towed within minutes. The name was to scare away civilians who might stumble on the listing for restaurants in the phone book. The foyer was painted flat black and unlit. This was the one sure place in the city cops would not be disturbed by accidental walk-ins.

  After Turner and Fenwick ate, they drove to a warehouse on the near west side about half a mile from the Loop. It was the home of Lost Chicago Records, the business of Jeremiah Boissec, the man who Mickey Pendyce said might be able to tell them more about Jonathan Zawicki. The building looked like it should be the next one to be rehabilitated or bulldozed in the march of the Loop’s economic renaissance westward. It was a one-story disaster waiting to collapse. The roof sagged. The exterior of all the windows had metal bars which didn’t look solid enough to keep out flies in summer. Instead of glass panes, warped boards covered all the windows. Shards of shattered glass littered the pavement. The sidewalk was cracked and broken. The black painted door rattled on its hinges as they opened it. The grime in the entryway could have served any twenty other buildings for a month. The receptionist chewed his gum and read a book, while lounging back on a chair which had two broken arms both held together with black electrical tape.

  Fenwick said, “We’re looking for Jeremiah Boissec.”

  “You found him.” Boissec was short, squat, and ugly. Warts on his nose, ear hair an inch long, nose hairs unclipped. “You the cops Mickey said were coming around?”

  They showed him ID.

  Boissec said, “Your buddy Zawicki is nuts.” He led them to an office. The difference between the decor back here and out front was a large metal desk doing its best to add rust to the grime surrounding it.

  The detectives settled themselves on metal chairs that could have been from the era before World War I. The grit on them almost certainly was.

  “What’s your history with Zawicki?” Turner asked.

  “I was vice-president in charge of creativity at Riveting Records. I developed new talent. I helped find new bands. I succeeded. I was on my way up in the industry. Then I crossed the son of a bitch. He said I’d never work in that town again.” Boissec shook his head. “I chose not to believe him. That was a mistake. He was quite right. I never worked in that town again. That was four years ago. I scrounged for a job for a couple years. Finally, I came back to Chicago. I develop talent here, manage a few acts.” He swept his arm around the office. “Hell of a place, huh? I do failure very well. I almost got a band on local cable once. Not a terrific track record. I used to be great, the best.”

  “Is Zawicki still holding you back?” Fenwick asked.

  “I’m off his radar screen.”

  “What got you fired?” Turner asked.

  “I objected to his method of recruiting members of groups.”

  Fenwick said, “You didn’t like it that he required the boy band members to service him?”

  “Boy bands? Ha! Zawicki did not discriminate. He made the women service him, too. He wasn’t choosy. He required half the people who worked for him to let him screw them. I didn’t have to because I am fat and ugly. I was lucky. I had talent. I got hired for my brains. And while I don’t want to seem like I’m defending him, he wasn’t the only executive in Hollywood screwing those who wanted a job. Actors, musicians, you name it, they want to be famous, they got to pay the price. No, everybody isn’t getting fucked to be famous, just almost everybody.”

  “I find that hard to believe,” Fenwick said.

  “Maybe I’m exaggerating, but I don’t think by much. Some Hollywood executives must be honorable. You’d think at least one of them. While I was out there, I never met him or her.”

  “Were you honorable?” Turner asked.

  “More than some, less than others.”

  Fenwick asked, “But how can he hope to silence a scandal of this proportion? People who turned him down, who didn’t make it. Employees he’s dropped or fired.”

  “How many actors or actresses have you heard accusing their producer, director, manager, agent, or anyone else of sexual harassment?”

  “None,” Fenwick admitted.

  “Precisely,” Boissec said. “Ain’t gonna happen. And in a boy band? They have enough problems with their sexual reputation as it is. Everybody thinks they’re gay.”

  “We know,” Fenwick said.

  “But there’s been a murder,” Turner said. “Why doesn’t that trump all of this?”

  “Only the murderer cares about that. Everybody else cares about fame, money, and their career. Plus Zawicki is very careful, very rich, very powerful, has lots of good lawyers, and there ain’t gonna be any proof. No tapes. No smoking gun. He is not a fool. Zawicki is still concerned about the bottom line. Two deaths in two days is enough to scare the piss out of anybody. One death and Zawicki can make a fortune—sympathy, nostalgia, sex, and intrigue, what could be a bigger draw? Two deaths? That gets dicey. My guess is Zawicki is planning with his creative team even as we speak on how to spin it or exploit it. If he can do either, he will.”

  “
He sounds like evil incarnate,” Fenwick said.

  “Nah, he’s a greedy Hollywood executive. Lots of people do think that’s synonymous with evil incarnate. He’s not acting out of character. If you’re one of the people who think consistency is a virtue and that as long as he’s consistent to what he believes in, then he’s a saint. Follow that logic to its conclusion and we’d all worship ants.” He shrugged. “Zawicki’s type is endemic and not just in Hollywood. It’s just more obvious and prominent in Hollywood. He’s also more honest than some. At least he doesn’t try to hide what a shit he is. I think on some level, it does bother him that these guys are dead. Nevertheless, I’m not sure he’s expressed a genuine emotion in a long time. That’s pathetic, but it’s not as sad as these poor guys getting killed.” He paused. “Don’t get me wrong. I’m not trying to build sympathy for the guy. I hate him. But he’s not an inhuman monster, not completely.”

  “But he’s got everybody covering for him about this sex thing.”

  “He’s not hiding what he is from them, just from the frenzied media hordes and secondarily from you.”

  “But he admitted it to us,” Fenwick protested.

  “Doesn’t matter. He knows as good government servants you can’t call a press conference and give this to the media. And if you have contacts in the media to try and get the story out, he has more and better contacts. He’s a pro with a media machine behind him. Can you match that?”

  Turner knew they couldn’t. They might not be out of their league, but they certainly were playing in the other guy’s ballpark.

  “Would he kill one of the band members himself?” Fenwick asked.

  “He wouldn’t have a reason to. At least I can’t think of one. They were making him tons of money.”

  “Would he murder someone who was going to tell or have someone murdered?”