Judgement

by Fergus Bannon

  A tall thin grey man in a worn tan suit was waiting for him by the remains of the apartment door. It had split from top to bottom, probably from where the lock had been hammered out. There were other jagged holes near the top and bottom of the door.

  'Leith?'

  Leith flashed his ID. The man took it and waggled it between thumb and forefinger. 'Its amazing,' he said gruffly, 'the way you can just come out with this. In the old days you had to get the FBI to do your dirty work. It’s getting worse than Russia used to be.' He shook his head then crooked a finger. 'Follow me.'

  The furniture in the room was old, cheap and worn. Comics, beer cans and dirty ashtrays littered a carpet that looked like it had not been cleaned for a decade or two. Patches of damp darkened the corners of the ceiling and several posters hung forlornly, corners flopped over where the adhesive tape had come away from walls. As Leith was led into one of the bedrooms he caught a glimpse of a garbage-dump kitchen.

  'Hey, Lieutenant. This is Leith.'

  Lundt was a small man, with short white blond hair receding markedly at the temples and a thin face with clear, pale skin. He was neatly dressed in a light plaid suit. His intense little eyes darted up and down, taking in Leith's hair and beard and his scuffed shoes.

  'Mind if I take a look at your ID?' he asked, finally.

  He checked through it carefully. 'Just back from vacation?'

  Leith nodded. It seemed the simplest thing to do.

  Lundt tapped the ID against his palm before handing it back. 'You worry me.'

  'Why's that?'

  'I don't see what this has to do with you.' The detective indicated the room with a wave of his hand. The glass panelled door from the filthy bedroom led directly onto the cramped concrete balcony. The apartment was north facing and the light was poor, adding to the overall air of dinginess. The block was the highest building around and looked over a vista of single and two storey houses set in ample, well-kept gardens. A passenger jet noisily struggled for altitude somewhere beyond the window.

  The detective walked round the bed: Leith followed him round until he could see the white tape marking where a body had lain. Lundt looked up at him. 'Its some kind of weird fag menage-a-trois — big fight blows up, jealousy probably. It’s a common thing with gays. ‘A’ knifes Middleton then, overcome with remorse, does a nose-dive off the balcony.' The detective led him onto the balcony and pointed down to the shattered slabs below.

  ' 'B' can't believe that both the people he loves most in the world are dead so he joins 'A'. This leaves me with only two questions,' Leith had to look away from the intense little eyes, 'firstly, was it Tim Garner or Terence Guin who was 'A'? Secondly, where the fuck does the CIA fit into all this?'

  'How do you know nobody else was involved?'

  Lundt sighed. 'The door was locked and bolted with heavy mortice jobs, top and bottom. We had a hell of a time breaking in.'

  Leith reached up to touch the floor of the next apartment.

  'Possible,' Lundt clenched his jaw, 'but the apartments below, above and to the sides were either occupied at the time or had their balcony doors locked. There's no sign that anyone got in or out that way.'

  'How do you know they were homosexual?'

  Lundt licked his lower lip. 'They made no secret of the fact, according to the neighbours. And some of the toys we found in here...' Leith opened his mouth to ask another question but Lundt interrupted him.

  'Ok— I've answered three questions and that about fulfils my instructions to 'Liaise with the CIA observer'.' He wiggled fore and middle fingers to signify quotation marks. 'Now you can answer my question, which I've asked twice already but you never answered. When I left here last night, I figured that would be just about it, except for several hundred reams of paperwork. But when I heard you were coming I figured I'd better come back and check I hadn't missed something. You see, the CIA isn't normally interested in run of the mill stuff like this. So tell me why you're here.'

  Leith shrugged. He knew he was supposed to keep tight-assed about these things, but Lundt didn't look like the kind of man who could be fobbed off.

  'Middleton may have had an association with a guy who may be a Middle Eastern terrorist. Did you know Middleton was a Muslim?'

  The detective shook his head. 'Well, if he was, I don't think he practised it with all his heart. The place is up to the rafters with empty booze bottles. But I guess we'd better bring in dogs to check for drugs and explosives.'

  'How did these guys get by?'

  'Temporary jobs: barmen, cashiers in supermarkets, that kind of thing. Neighbours reckoned they ran a mobile disco. They certainly had plenty of equipment. Check it out for yourself, it's in the second bedroom.'

  Lundt led him into a room that had been emptied of bedding and furniture. It seemed to have become a communal dump full of broken bits of electrical and electronic equipment, but was dominated by a monstrosity covered in peeling decals of stars and planets and a painted sign saying: 'Whirling Dervishes Disco.' Two turntables rested on what had probably been a desk with a couple of large amplifiers lying overturned on either side. Various pieces of esoteric Army surplus equipment had been bolted to the desk in an attempt to give it a nightmare cyberpunk feel. Leith recognised a large siren that had been painted in metallic phosphorescent colours, forming the nose of a large construct looming over the back of the DJ's swivel chair. The eyes were made from satellite dishes, and the mouth was a large rusty bear trap. Scaffolding, supposed to represent metal arms sprang from either side, one ending in a chainsaw, the other in a mock up of a ray gun, the end of which Leith recognised as a microwave dish.

  He scraped his hand across the top of the desk and it came away dusty. 'Looks like they didn't get much business,' he stepped back to get a better look at the whole thing, 'but then I can see why.'

  'I had the dogs in to check this crap for drugs. I guess I'd better get forensics to check this stuff thoroughly.'

  Leith walked round the desk to take a closer look at the microwave dish. He found a painted-over power cable hugging a support clamp. The cable then dived straight into a hole in the scaffolding. He followed the scaffolding down to where it was welded to the leg of the desk.

  Lundt had come up beside him. Leith glanced up. 'Mind if I take off this panel at the back?'

  The detective looked at where he was pointing. He shrugged.

  It took a while, and Lundt eventually had to send a patrolman down to his car to fetch a toolkit, but finally Leith managed to undo the four assorted screws that secured the dusty panel. A stack of old amplifiers, dirty and covered in grease, filled the space behind the panel where the drawers should have been. He eased a screwdriver between an amplifier and the side panel and managed to prize them apart by a few millimetres. It was hard to see, even with a police flashlight shining in, but it looked like a cable came out from where the panel touched the desk leg, and went into one of the amplifiers.

  'This doesn't make sense,' he mused. 'The dish isn't just for show. It looks like it's actually hooked up to these industrial power amplifiers.' He reached across and began to undo the panel on the other side of the desk.

  'This is a transformer,' he poked at the metal box which was revealed. 'The dish really could put out microwaves.'

  'You mean it's some kind of weapon?' There was a new intensity in the cop's voice.

  'No, it's not like a microwave oven or anything like that. Too low powered even with these.' He touched the amplifiers then started to check the equipment more carefully. 'These things are used for communications by the military and sometimes in civil applications where a lot of data is being shunted around.'

  He poked around for a while longer but found no more surprises. By the time he had finished, Lundt had gone to speak to one of his men. Leith found him in the kitchen.

  'I think I'll ask some NSA people to have a look at that set-up. It could just be that the kids were frigging about with the equipment. Maybe they thought the 'magic waves' would enh
ance the music. It's worth getting checked out.'

  The lieutenant took him through the rest of the apartment. There were very few personal possessions, most of them in Guin's room. Guin Shad rented the flat two years before, Lundt told him, and Garner had taken up occupancy a few months later. Middleton had been an infrequent visitor.

  'I guess you'll want to see the bodies,' Lundt said suddenly, as they were searching through Guin's bedroom.

  Leith couldn't think of one good reason why he should but Lundt to think it was expected of him, like it was some kind of formality.

  'Sure,' he replied.

  Two fruitless hours later Leith was following Lundt's grey Oldsmobile along the five miles to the public mortuary that served the eastern section of Long Island. He had an impression of streets full of conservatively styled houses as they sped by on the raised freeway. He was still puzzling about the microwave transmitter when Lundt suddenly pulled into a parking lot in front of a single storey brick building set back from the street. There were no signs signifying the building's purpose; perhaps the neighbours had objected.

  By the time he had parked and gotten out of the car, Lundt had already disappeared into the building. Joining him in the drab grey entrance hall, Leith found that the cop had already squared things with the mortuary guard. Lundt took him by the upper arm and steered him through the 'Staff Only' door and into the vault room. Four banks of four vertical stainless steel doors were set into the apple green walls. He became aware of a heavy, cloying smell that was barely disguised by the overlay of disinfectant and air freshener.

  A short, thickset guy in surgical greens came through one of the other doors. He wore black spectacles and his face, when he removed his disposable mask, was rosy-cheeked and cheerful.

  'Hi there, Vic. Life been kind to you?'

  Lundt gave a twisted little grin. 'As always. Doctor Wills, I'd like you to meet Dr. Leith. Doctor Wills is our pathologist.'

  Wills' handshake was firm and sustained. 'A medical man?' he asked.

  Leith shook his head. 'No, Phd. Computer Science.'

  Wills seemed a little taken aback. 'Oh, I'm sorry, were you a relative of the deceased?'

  'No, Doctor Leith is here as an observer from...a government agency... you know what I mean,' Lundt tapped a forefinger to one side of his nose and closed one eye, which Leith figured was marginally better than spelling it out in neon.

  Wills' eyes narrowed a little. 'That's interesting,' he said.

  Lundt didn't miss a trick. He shifted his stance as though trying to resist straining forwards. 'How do you mean, Doc?'

  The pathologist pursed his lips. 'Yeah, well, there's a couple of little things that puzzled me about these cadavers. Take the guy who was stabbed, for example: theory I heard was, this was some kind of gay crime of passion, but the guy was stabbed only once and in a very clinical way. Straight down between the third and fourth ribs, piercing the myocardium. Just how I would do it in fact, but probably not if I was in a rage. The guy would have had to be totally immobilised, of course.' Wills shook his head and took off his green cap. The bald crown of his head reflected the light from the fluorescents.

  'When it comes to knifings, people seem to have learned a lot from TV. The natural impulse is to grab the handle of the knife in your fist, like this—' he mimed an overhand stabbing action '—and to stab down. But you'd keep bouncing off the ribs, so it's not often effective. But like I say people have learned from all the cop shows. So, even when they go berserk they usually cradle the handle in their palm, thrusting up and under the ribcage, into the diaphragm and heart. Much better. But straight in, like in this case— I don't think I've ever seen that before. It's not even as if the victim was comatose or drugged. The bruises show the guy was held tight, and I mean really tight.'

  Wills looked at Lundt. 'Another thing. All these guys were supposed to be gays but there's no sign of anal dilation. Not that that means anything definite, penetrative sex amongst gays is pretty passe but it's something that most do try at least a couple of times.' He walked over to the safes. 'And check out the other two.'

  He stepped over towards the bank of doors, then hesitated. 'Hey, Vic, you know that Las Vegas thing? Queens already been on to me.'

  'Yeah? What for?'

  'They want me on standby. They'd already cleared it with the county so's I can moonlight. We could be talking serious fees here. Just as well with Christmas coming up.'

  ''It's an ill wind', as they say. Glad I moved out of the City.' Lundt looked at Leith. 'You guys know anything more about this?'

  'About what?'

  'The Vegas thing.'

  'I only know what I heard on the radio this morning. What's it got to do with Dr. Wills and Queens?'

  Lundt and Wills exchanged glances. The cop looked back at Leith.

  'Power vacuums. The guys who were killed in Vegas, they kept things stable, kept all the factions in check. Now the lids off they'll be hacking each other to pieces. Queens is where the Columbians hang out. There'll be some heavy business, which is why they want to draft in the Doc.'

  'Does that mean you're pleased about the massacre?'

  'I'm not going to cry myself to sleep, if that's what you're suggesting. In the short term it's a bad thing, and a lot of people are going to get killed. In the medium term...who knows, it might even calm things down a little. But in the long term it don't matter a shit.' He turned back to Wills. 'You were going to show us the others.'

  Wills nodded and reached across to one of the doors on the right hand column. He flipped the steel locking lever anticlockwise, opened the door and pulled out the steel tray. A large opaque green plastic bag lay on top of it. Wills started to pull down the zipper.

  'They're covered in white sheets in the movies,' said Leith, absently.

  Lundt's eyes flicked up to look at him. 'You ever seen a leaper before, Dr. Leith?'

  Leith shook his head.

  The detective started to reach out for Wills. ' Hey, Doc, maybe...' But it was too late.'Feeling better now, son?' Wills eased a glass of iced water into his hand. Leith lowered the cold compress from his forehead and took a swig from the plastic cup.

  Wills turned to look at Lundt. 'Its always the big guys,' he said happily. 'I get nurses and policewomen, little girls straight out of school, and they take this kind of thing, no problem. They don't like it but they can handle it.' He looked back at Leith, 'Then I get some big hairy-assed rookie and he drops like a sack of shit. I should have seen it coming but I was too preoccupied.' He put a hand on Leith's shoulder. 'Sorry, son.'

  'My fault, ' mumbled Leith. 'My fault entirely.'

  He took another swig from the cup and tried to frame a question without summoning up a vision of the horror in the green bag.

  'I guess I realised that the body would be badly damaged, but that ...'

  Wills nodded his head and turned to Lundt. 'He's right, you know. That was another one of those little problems I was talking about.'

  Lundt's brow knitted up, pulling his widow's peak forward. 'Come off it, Doc. I've seen leapers like this God knows how many times. They all look like an explosion in a slaughterhouse.' He held a hand up to Leith who had gulped loudly. 'Sorry.' He looked back at the pathologist. ' But so what?'

  'And where was this, Vic? Manhattan? How far did they fall? Four hundred, five hundred feet? Now, these guys fell less than a hundred according to your own report.'

  'Yes, but onto concrete. What did you expect? A bad graze, some light bruising?'

  Leith put the cup down. 'What about terminal velocities?'

  The pathologist nodded. 'Yeah, I had to check up on that,' he looked back at Lundt. 'Objects reach a steady speed if they drop from high enough. It's the air resistance that balances the force of gravity so they can't go any faster. But they have to be doing about 120 miles an hour before that happens. That's the terminal velocity. The books say an object has to drop from at least 500 feet to get up to that speed. A body falling from the tenth floor of a
n apartment would be doing 50 miles per hour, tops, by the time it hit. There is some doubt in my mind as to whether this would be enough to shatter every bone and rupture every organ in these bodies, even if they did land on concrete. I reserve my judgement until I can get someone with more experience to take a look.'

  Lundt exhaled heavily. He put his hands on his hips and stared down at his feet. 'You're crazy. I mean, what are you trying to tell me? That these guys were dropped from some tall building, then all their bits and pieces carefully scraped off the sidewalk, that they were transported back to Woodhaven and dumped onto some cement blocks which were smashed up to make it look like they fell from their own apartment? Jesus Christ. Am I really hearing this?'

  Wills shrugged. 'Yeah, its crazy. Maybe these injuries were sustained from a hundred foot fall onto concrete, but there's doubt in my mind. Vic, so I've got to follow it up. Sorry.'

  Lundt turned to stare at Leith, saying nothing.

  CHAPTER 4

  Woodhaven, Long Island

  The day had seemed endless. Once he felt better he went with Lundt to Police Headquarters to check out a pile of useless statements from the mens' neighbours. Lack of sleep, lack of food and the delayed effects of Lola's lovemaking seemed to hit him all at once. The statement he’d been reading blurred and shifted, and he dropped it back onto the heap.

  He soon found the Days Inn Lundt had recommended. It had a bar. He sat there alone for two hours, drinking scotch until he thought he might have a chance at some rest. The room they gave him was quiet and comfortable enough but always, just as he was on the hazy verge of sleep, that single snapshot vision would spring unbidden to his mind and he would sit bolt upright, sometimes too late to stifle the shocked cry.

  Finally at three in the morning, unable to bear the room's air-conditioned limbo any longer, he got up, showered and dressed and checked out.

  He drove back to Langley without stopping. The sun came up into a cloudless sky as he crossed into Virginia. It was going to be another nice day.