by Mark Gilleo
“As potential suspects?” Emily asked.
Dan nodded. “If Tyrone did kill six people and he was found innocent, that means six people were killed without justice. That may be enough motive for someone to want Tyrone dead. Six people with fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, husbands, wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, buddies. You name it. Most of the witnesses and the names of the deceased should be included in the transcripts and on the witness lists. Only the juror information is anonymous. Dig around and see what you can find. Who knows, maybe there’s a connection to our guy with the cap and sunglasses.”
“I’ll get started,” Emily responded.
“We need names, bios, photos,” Wallace added, thinking out loud. “Create a dossier for everyone who was a witness at the trial or is a relative of the deceased. And take a good look at the rich kids. Let’s make sure we aren’t just assuming they’re rich because they’re white kids from the suburbs. Let’s get a handle on how much money we’re talking about.”
“We also need to let any surviving jurors know their lives could be in danger. Let the ones who still have their heads know that they may want to keep them down. We need to know who they are and how to reach them, and that’s going to require a court order to see the anonymous juror list,” Dan said.
“How long will a court order take?” Emily asked.
“It all depends,” Dan answered. “Should be less than twenty-four hours. Could be a couple of days. Depends on who is involved. First someone needs to locate the judge. Then we are going to need the judge to approve the order. Then someone is going to need to locate the physical records. A source told me that information on anonymous juries can be hard to come by.”
“Let me talk to the Captain and get the ball rolling,” Wallace said, looking in Dan’s direction. “But just so you know, two court requests in one week with your name attached is pushing my luck.”
“While I’m pushing my luck, can I get a copy of the police file on Tyrone’s shooting?”
“You want the files for Tyrone’s murder?”
“That’s right. I want to take a look at it.”
“You think the same person who is killing jurors could have killed Tyrone?”
“It seems like a possibility.”
“I can get you that file in a few minutes.” Detective Wallace stood and then motioned at the stack of boxes. “Start reading.”
*
Dan placed the top of the first box on the floor and opened the top folder. He sat down, perused the first page and then began flipping pages at a brisk pace.
An hour later Emily succumbed to curiosity. “Are you reading, or skimming?”
“Reading,” Dan answered without looking up.
“You look like you took one of those speed reading courses you see on late night television.”
“Just spent a lot of time without good television when I was growing up.”
“Where exactly did you grow up?”
“Africa, Southeast Asia, Russia.”
“Army brat?”
“Foreign Service.”
“It must have been fascinating.”
Dan stopped reading and raised his head. “It had its moments. Some of those memories have since been tarnished by reality, but it was a good way to learn about the world.”
“So you read a lot?”
“A lot,” Dan answered, his eyes dropping back to the folder in front of him.
“Well, I can’t read without a break. I’m going to get some more coffee. You want some?”
“No thanks. I’m good.”
Emily stood and stepped away from the table. Dan allowed his eyes another momentary break from reading; just long enough to check out Fields’ derriere as it moved through the maze of desks. Five minutes later, Emily returned with a file in her hand. “Detective Wallace gave me the police file on Tyrone Biggs’s murder. It remains unsolved.”
Dan took the folder and read it while standing, flipping pages. Minutes later Dan stopped turning pages in the file. He returned to the previous page, flipped forward again, and then reread the passage that initially gave him pause. He grabbed a yellow legal pad, placed it next to the open folder, and then jotted several notes on the top yellow sheet.
“I’m going to check on something,” he said, without breaking pace, heading for the door.
“Want some company?”
“Absolutely not. I’ll do better without the police.”
“No offense taken, in case you were wondering.”
“I wasn’t.”
“What do you want me to tell Wallace when he gets back?”
“Tell him to hurry up with the court order. We need the jury list.”
Chapter 50
Dan drove his four-door sedan down the street with his head on a swivel. He could feel his .45 caliber in the back of his waistband, pressed snugly between the weight of his body and the bucket seat. He also felt the slight gravitational tug of the .38 revolver strapped to his right ankle.
Dan glanced at the address on the Post-It Note stuck to the dash of the car and slowed to read the house number over the door of an old brick building with boarded up windows. The next block sported the skeletal remains of a gas station vaguely recognizable amidst the rust-covered piles of metal and abandoned appliances. Across the street, a high chain-link fence surrounded an empty lot on the corner.
A minute later, Dan pulled to the curb in front of an old wood house. A covered porch stretched the width of the home. Metal bars secured two symmetrical windows. A gate reinforced the front door.
Dan stepped from the car and eyed the small apartment building next door. A dilapidated fire escape dripped down the side of the building, tilting away from the structure as if testing gravity. Freshly laundered clothes, clipped to the fire escape, flapped in a gentle breeze on the upper floors. As Dan’s eyes reached the first floor, the face of an old man disappeared behind a set of moving curtains.
Dan returned his eyes to the old house and he approached the porch. At the top of the stairs, Dan could feel the old boards bounce slightly under his weight. The aged wood squeaked and groaned, rusted nails threatening to release their anchors.
Dan knocked on the front door and took another look to his left and right. Movement echoed from the other side of the door. A thud. A flushing toilet. The clanking of glass and metal. Dan knocked again and the light coming through the peephole in the door went dark, indicating someone was peeking out.
“I’m looking for Ernest Biggs,” Dan said.
“Who are you?”
“Dan Lord. I’m an attorney.”
“We don’t need an attorney.”
“I wanted to ask you a couple of questions about your brother’s death.”
A long silence followed, interrupted by the rattling of locks and chains. The internal wood door swung open and a twenty-something young man in a burgundy collared shirt and khaki pants stood on the other side of the heavily barred security door. “Step back. I’ll come out and we can talk on the porch. I don’t want anyone thinking I’m hiding anything or talking to a cop.”
Dan moved over and Ernest Biggs stepped from the house, the front door hinges squeaking in protest. The security door slammed shut with a resounding thud. Dan extended his hand and the young man just stared at the gesture, Dan’s hand, frozen in the air, waist high.
“Name is Dan Lord,” Dan repeated. “I’m an attorney and a private detective.”
“You helping to catch my brother’s killer?”
“Maybe.”
“You know the cops didn’t do shit.”
“That’s what I want to know. What do you mean? Talk to me.”
“I mean when my brother was killed, the cops didn’t spend but ten minutes out here investigating. They asked a few questions to some witnesses and they took a couple of pictures, and that was it. The sidewalk was hosed off before my brother’s body reached the hospital.”
“Sorry for your loss.”
“You ever lost a b
rother?”
“Well, yeah. A few years ago.”
Ernest Biggs stared at Dan and slowly nodded his head. “Nice to meet you, Dan. Ernest Biggs.”
“Nice to meet you, Ernest. What can you tell me about the night your brother was killed?”
“Are you familiar with the case?”
“I know what’s written in the police report. I read it for the first time this morning.”
“Then you might know all you’re ever going to know. Tyrone is dead. Shot point blank. Right over there.” Ernest pointed to a spot in the middle of the sidewalk thirty feet away. “Been dead for two years. Two years last October.”
“And they never found the killer,” Dan Lord said.
“The cops? Hell no. Nothing unusual around here. We know how it works. Most of the time, no one’s even trying to solve a murder in this neighborhood. The cops show up and pose for a little investigating. They bang on a couple doors, take a couple of notes, and then move on to the crimes people care about. Our little corner of paradise known as Anacostia isn’t on the police’s give-a-shit list.”
“You have any idea who killed him? Anything new come to mind in the last couple of years? Anyone bragging about something they might have done?”
“Shit. I don’t know nothing for sure. Everybody’s got an opinion. Lots of chatter on the street for a while. Tyrone had big business and big business comes with big risks. So if you ask me who killed him, I say business gone bad killed him. Could have been something else too. Jealous friends. Jealous women. The reason don’t matter because there isn’t always a reason. You can be sitting on your porch and catch one from a car driving down the street. Get a bullet in the back just walking down the sidewalk, minding your own business. The bullets don’t care and the people shooting them don’t care either.”
“How old were you when Tyrone was killed?”
“I was in high school. Senior year. Graduated, too. Didn’t get me far, though. I still live here with my momma. Got a government job doing maintenance work at the Department of Education. Work evenings mostly. Trying to stay right-side up. It’s hard. In this neighborhood, it’s real hard.”
“So nothing new from anyone remembering anything?”
“Nothing new. Nothing old. You said you have the police records. Detectives came out and asked around. Everyone saw something. No one saw the same thing. There was a group of boys drinking forties down the block. Shady Tree Eddy was closing up late from fixing a car at the old station three doors down.”
“What about the old man next door?” Dan asked, motioning towards the face that was again pressed against the window.
“Old Man Johnson has his nose pressed to the glass all four seasons of the year.”
“What did he see?”
“He says he didn’t see nothing that day, but he has a theory.”
“What’s that?”
“He said he thinks a woman did it.”
“A woman?”
“A white woman.”
Dan looked around. “You sure?”
“That’s what he says.”
“But he didn’t see anything the day of the murder?”
“That’s right.”
“And, yet, he still thinks a white woman shot your brother?”
“Yep.”
“Is he crazy?”
“He doesn’t get out much. But I haven’t seen him taking a shit in the bushes, which is what the lady around the corner started doing once her dementia got real bad.”
“A woman killed Tyrone?”
“Go ask him.”
“What did you say his name was?”
“Old Man Johnson.”
“What’s his first name?”
“Don’t know his first name. My momma probably does, but she isn’t around. She’s out at the beauty salon. Be back later.”
“Anything else you can tell me?”
“My brother wasn’t no saint. He was a dealer. Rap sheet down to his knees. Made a lot of money, had a lot of friends, had a lot of enemies, and was killed. That is what this neighborhood does. Produces kids with guns and bad friends who learn to rob and sell drugs.”
“Did you attend your brother’s trial?”
“Which one?”
“Any of them.”
“For his murder, there was no trial. No suspects. Nothing. A dead drug dealer, period.”
“How about the H2O trial?”
“No. My momma didn’t want me to hear all of that. Even though I knew more than she did.”
“Did your brother do it?”
“Shoot up the club?”
“Yes. That’s my question.”
“I wasn’t there so I can’t say for sure, but when you have something like thirty witnesses, you get the feeling he could have done it.”
“And he walked.”
“He walked. Yes, he did. But you know what’s funny? The system likes rich white people. Doesn’t like rich black people as much. Rich white guys with teams of lawyers walk all the time and no one cares. A young black man with money walks and all hell breaks loose.”
“I think it has something to do with how the money is gained.”
Ernest Biggs looked around. “What options do you see around you? Make money how you can make it.”
*
Dan stepped into the small foyer of the apartment building next door. He ran his finger along the nametags on the bank of mailboxes for the building. Apartment A-1 was labeled “Johnson” and Dan stepped to the first door on the left and knocked twice.
“Who is it?” the voice asked through the door, feet shuffling across the floor like slow-moving sandpaper blocks.
“Dan Lord. Attorney and private detective.”
“Well, which one’s going to be there if I open this door?”
“Whichever one you’re more willing to talk to.”
Dan listened to unintelligible mumbling through the door as the neighborhood Peeping Tom considered his potential guest. Dan stepped back as the silence was broken by two dead bolts unlocking and a security chain sliding off its rails.
Old Man Johnson offered half a smile of full dentures. His white teeth were multiple shades lighter than the gray hair that covered his head. Thick brown glasses framed a pair of eyes full of suspicion as they groped Dan.
“Attorney and private detective?”
“Yes, sir,” Dan answered.
“My name is Claude Johnson. You can call me Johnson. Hell, you can even call me Old Man Johnson, if you want.”
“Nice to meet you, Mr. Johnson,” Dan replied, pushing his hand out as the elderly man opened the door. Mr. Johnson returned the handshake.
“Well, don’t just stand there heating the building, come on in.”
“Thank you.”
Dan stepped into the perfectly organized bachelor pad. Neat stacks of newspapers rested on the small dining table. An old chair with a knitted blanket rested in the corner, near the front window. The stifling heat forced Dan to unzip his jacket.
“Sit down. I’ll make some coffee.”
Ice coffee? Dan thought. “Sounds great.”
Dan listened as Claude Johnson rattled and putzed around the kitchen.
“So what do you want with an old timer like me?”
“It isn’t your age that interests me,” Dan said.
“Well, what is it then? I know it isn’t my cooking or my youthful appearance.”
“You always pay attention to what’s going on outside?”
“Sure. Don’t you? Shouldn’t everyone?”
“Maybe they should, but they don’t,” Dan said. “If they did, I would be out of a job pretty quickly.”
“If people not paying attention covers your rent, then I guess you can’t complain too much.”
“Guess not. Ernest next door says you pay attention and that you have a theory on who killed Tyrone Biggs.”
“I do. I do.”
“You want to share?”
“Sure, but let me clear the air about
something first. Tyrone got what was coming to him.”
“How’s that?” Dan asked.
“He was a punk. A know-nothing, do-nothing punk.”
“So you didn’t have fond feelings for him?”
“I didn’t say that.”
Dan had an inkling of where this conversation was going and he leaned back in his chair waiting to hear the rest of Old Man Johnson’s pontification.
“Tyrone was a punk. And that was on a good day. But he was our punk. I mean, he grew up next door. When his career took off, and I use the word “career” with a snicker, he moved out and bought the house two doors down on the other side of the street. His mother didn’t want drugs under her roof.”
“If I were his mother, I would’ve asked him to move a little farther away.”
“Wouldn’t have mattered. Nothing was going to stop him from anything. Tyrone was dealing. Drinking. Did it all right out in the open. Stood on the corner most nights smoking, hanging with his posse. But if anyone tried anything on his turf, he dealt with it. An old man like me can appreciate a little peace.”
“Tyrone was a keeper of the peace?”
“In this neighborhood, he was. Took care of business.”
Dan nodded.
Johnson continued. “The more peaceful it was, the less reason the police had to come around. And Tyrone didn’t need the police to run his business. He needed the lack of police.”
“I understand where you’re coming from.”
“That’s probably something hard to imagine if you haven’t been around it.”
Dan stifled the urge to tell him he had seen it before, in a dozen locations around the world.
“So he grew up next door. Did you know him well?” Dan asked.
“Of course I knew the man. I’ve been here since before he was born. Know his mother real well. Good woman. Real good woman.”
“After Tyrone was killed, did the detectives speak with you?”
“You know it.”
“Did you tell them about your theory?”
“It ain’t no theory. Tyrone was killed by a woman. A white woman.”
“A white woman?”
“You heard me right.”
Dan took a deep breath. “A working girl?”
“You’re kidding, right? A white working girl in this neighborhood?”