Murder Most Strange

by Dell Shannon

  "Just showing up. We'll have a look and find out. But it's an interesting case, Lieutenant. We'll look after him. I don't suppose it's likely to come to trial."

  "That depends on you, Doctor," said Mendoza dryly.

  "Yes, well," said Dr. Steiner, "I'm scarcely likely to tell a judge he's responsible for his actions."

  Holland would probably end up in Atascadero.

  On the way back downtown Palliser said, "God. What a senseless damned random thing, those harmless fellows killed because he'd gone that far off the beam. And originally, take it back to beginnings, because they never caught up to Seacarn."

  "The kind of thing that happens," said Mendoza. "The human nature we're here to deal with, John."

  * * *

  When he turned up Hamlin Place and at the top of it came to the impressive wrought-iron gates, he pushed the gadget on the dashboard and the gates swung open silently and majestically. But as he accelerated, the gates began to close again, and only a frantic reversal saved the Ferrari's nose from being smashed; they were heavy gates. Mendoza swore and tried the thing again; the gates opened and immediately closed. Something wrong with the damned electric eye, he thought. The only drawback to the marvelous mechanisms was that the more complex they were, the more could go wrong with them. The gates were, of course, operable manually, and he got out and opened them, drove through, got out and closed them again, and drove on up to the house.

  Mairi's car wasn't in the garage, and he wondered where she was. He walked into the kitchen and found it empty; the whole house was silent. No twins came running. He left his hat on the kitchen table and went down the hall. He found Mairi just starting up the front stairs; she gave him a frosty glance. Wondering what he'd done, Mendoza went on into the living room. Here he found Alison lying back in his armchair with her feet up and her eyes closed, with two cats on her lap and two beside her and Cedric sound asleep on the floor beside the ottoman.

  "Querida, there's something wrong with that damned electric eye, and—"

  Alison opened one eye and squinted up at him. "Oh, are you telling me!" she said bitterly. "When I went out this morning, the damned gate let me get halfway through and then banged in the whole rear end of the Facel-Vega. It's running, but the garage says there's about three hundred dollars' worth of dents to be ironed out."

  "¡Por Dios!" said Mendoza. "I never looked at your car—”

  "And I didn't know Mairi was going out, or I'd have called to warn her. And when she went out, the gates let her out all right, but when she came back they smashed in the front of the Chevy and ruined her radiator, and the car had to be towed in to the garage. And she's so annoyed about it she's been talking broader and broader Scots ever since."

  "¡Caray!" said Mendoza, amused.

  "So I called the company, and the man said it probably just needs adjusting, and he'll come out tomorrow."

  "Good."

  "But our precious offspring, having attention called to the gates, wandered down there when nobody was looking and played around opening and shutting them, and of course when they got bored and came back to the house they left the gates open. And all the sheep got out."

  "¡Desastre!" said Mendoza.

  "Ken was up on the roof of their garage putting on shingles, and just happened to glance down the hill. He had an awful time rounding them up and getting them back in, they were starting down into Burbank— Well, it's not that funny, Luis! What a day! And the twins are confined to quarters. And if you'd like to take me out to dinner, I won't say no."

  * * *

  Glasser was off on Friday. They'd be glad to have Nick Galeano back, with business picking up a little. Overnight there had been a felony hit-run on Hill, a woman and child killed and another woman injured; she might be able to give them a description of the car, when she could be seen in the hospital.

  There was still paperwork to be done on the Patterson case, and the other heisters to look for, and the new one that had gotten started yesterday. But Hackett came into Mendoza's office, sat down and lit a cigarette and said, "What you were telling me about that lawyer—you know, Luis, I still don't think we know the whole story on Parmenter. I've just got a funny feeling on that one."

  "Oh, I've had the same thought," said Mendoza. He leaned back and blew smoke at the ceiling.

  "Hunch?"

  "No hunch." And detectives weren't supposed to work by hunches, but one reason that Luis Rodolfo Vicente Mendoza sometimes saw through a difficult case where logic failed was that he was prone to the hunches now and then. "Just a funny feeling, as you say."

  "When you come to think of it, can you really see any of that—that furtive little bunch killing him? I know it wasn't intentional, he had a heart attack, but—even beating him lip."

  "No, not men of action. But he didn't seem to know anybody else." The phone rang and Mendoza picked it up.

  "It's the D.A.'s office," said Lake. "They want a conference about Upchurch."

  "¡Por Dios! What's it got to do with me? It's their baby now." He had won the bet; Rosalie was spread all over front pages, and possibly would end up getting screen tests offered.

  "Oh, all right, all right. What time?"

  "Three o'clock."

  "Well, I suppose I'd better go and earn my pay for once."

  Hackett got up. "George hasn't been able to find out a single thing about that Fuller. At least our Dapper Dan missed last Sunday, I wonder if he's got a victim picked out for next Sunday."

  "Don't borrow trouble, chico."

  "And how in hell we'd ever catch up to that one . . ."

  Grace and Palliser were now getting statements from the wives of the men involved with Goodis; the D.A. hadn't decided yet whether to charge them as accessories.

  Mendoza was sitting there thinking about Parmenter, about any possible way to set up a trap for Dapper Dan—but his imagination failed him there—when Lake brought in a big handsome young fellow in uniform and a tall thin miserable-looking kid. "And what is this in aid of?" asked Mendoza.

  The uniformed man almost shied back. He said humbly, apologetically, "I'm very sorry to disturb you, Lieutenant, but I figured it was the right place to come. I mean, we're supposed to do everything by the book, sir, and that's what I thought was right to do. To bring him here."

  "How long have you been riding a squad—what's your name?"

  "McConnell, sir. Dave McConnell. Thirty-two days, sir."

  Mendoza grinned at him. "Well, not that I want to encourage insubordination, but just bear it in mind when you're talking to any brass that all of us started out riding a squad and there was a time when all of us had been wearing the uniform just thirty-two days. ¡Dios! When I was riding a squad, this was a hell of a lot easier town to police than it is now. I don't envy you. So tell me why you've come to see me."

  McConnell relaxed a little. "This kid," he said. "I was stopped for a light at Woodlawn and Santa Barbara, and he came up to the squad and said he wanted to confess to a murder. And he gave me a gun."

  "¿Qué es esta? Let's have it."

  McConnell stepped closer and laid a gun on the desk.

  Mendoza looked at it with interest. "That's fine, McConnell—thanks, we'll take it from here. And you did right—going by the book."

  "Thank you, sir." McConnell very nearly saluted, and with encouragement might have backed out; Mendoza, never especially concerned with protocol, didn't realize what a reputation he had on this force.

  He looked at the kid. Not quite a kid: at least six-two, but gangling and skinny, probably looking younger than he was, with a narrow weak face. "Suppose you sit down," he said. Silently the kid sat down in the chair beside the desk. "Like to tell me your name?"

  "Tommy—Tommy Hernandez."

  Mendoza got up and went out to see who was in. Wanda was typing a report; he lifted a finger and she followed him back to his office. "Tommy Hernandez. He says he wants to talk about a murder. What about it, Tommy?"

  He looked ready to cry. He was
n't a bad-looking boy, in a girlish way; he had black hair a little untidy but not overlong, neat features. He said in a thin voice, "I been thinking about it ever since, I just can't stop thinking about it, and I never felt so bad in my life. Mr. Robillard—he was just the nicest guy in the world, I'd never do anything to hurt Mr. Robillard. He used to help me with lots of things when he hadn't no call to. It was the money, that was all. I just wanted the money."

  "All right," said Mendoza. "Tell it from the beginning."

  He sat there with his head down, and he said miserably, "I couldn't get a job, I mean to keep. I got the diploma when I graduated, and I thought that meant I knew something, I didn't do too bad all through school. But I got the job at the gas station, and after a couple days the boss said damn stupid kid, they don't teach you enough arithmetic to make change, and he fired me. I couldn't learn to work that register thing at all. And Mom said try the employment agency so I did, and they gave me a kind of test and I got all mixed up, I couldn't make out the questions, and the guy said I was func-func something illiterate and it'd be hard to find me a job. And then I got a job at the market, putting things in bags and carrying them out for people, only I couldn't do that right either, they got mad at me because I mixed things up, you're supposed like to put certain things in the same bags and I couldn't read what it said on the packages, all different kinds of letters. And I wanted to help Mom—she always needs money so bad. See, my dad died a couple of years ago. He got sick and died. And Mom has to work, she works at a place where they make ladies' dresses. And I got three brothers, they're all younger'n me, Billy's only ten, and they need things." He looked up at Mendoza, and there was a terrible bewilderment in his dark eyes. "Last year," he said, and paused, "last year, before I graduated, everybody thought I was great. I did pretty good on the basketball team. Everybody cheered when I made a basket. And then all of a sudden I'm no good for anything. And I wanted to get some money for Mom, and I thought if I wasn't smart enough to keep a job, maybe I could be a crook and just steal some. If I wasn't no good anyway—

  "And I remembered how Mis' Flowers always brings out the cafeteria money in the afternoon. I guess I just didn't think about anybody else maybe bein' there. I knew which was her car."

  "Where did you get the gun?" asked Mendoza.

  "Oh, it was my dad's, to scare burglars with. I think Mom forgot it was there, on the closet shelf. I was just going to scare Mis' Flowers with it, to get the money. I didn't know there were any bullets in it." He gave a sudden dry sob. "I never meant to shoot it! But when I heard Mr. Robillard yel1—I never knew he was there—it scared me and I turned around and it went off all by itself—I never knew a gun could go off all by itself like that—"

  Mendoza sighed. An automatic could be a tricky sort of gun, and a lot of them had a very light pull. If there was a charge left up the spout ready to go . . .

  He began to cry. "It's gonna hurt my mom awful bad—find out I did a thing like that—I never meant to do a thing like that—and Mr. Robillard . . ."

  Wanda sighed too. And this was another senseless random thing, and what would happen to Tommy now was in the lap of the gods.

  But later on, when the warrant had been applied for and he'd been booked into jail and Wanda was typing a report on it, Mendoza said to her, "Don't mention rehabilitation services in prison."

  "Don't they ever work?"

  "It's a nice idea in theory. About once in a thousand times. What annoys the hell out of me is these damned schools that don't even teach the kids to read, and then hand them the nice diploma that says they're educated. Maybe they'll teach him to read in prison." He wandered back to his office sadly. Cases like that depressed him.

  * * *

  Higgins was feeling annoyed and frustrated. The hotel-in-quotes on Temple was a sleazy sort of place, and tenants came and went without any sort of record being kept. All the manager, the desk clerk, whatever he called himself, could say was how long Fuller had been there, that he didn't seem to have a regular job but paid for his room on time. There hadn't been anything in the room to suggest any kind of background for Fuller; in fact it was just a little mystery, who he'd been and why anybody had shot him and who that had been.

  He and Landers had been here again this afternoon, talking to the various tenants who were on Social Security, who had night jobs, and they hadn't gotten any new information. They were just thinking of knocking off and going back to the office when Higgins remembered that he hadn't talked to the man in the next room to Fuller's. Gillespie. He went over to the desk, where the manager—desk clerk was sitting reading a paperback Western, and asked him if Mr. Gillespie had come back yet. Another mystery, that one taking off for a few days now and then; maybe off on a drunk.

  "Yeah," said the manager. "He came back last night, I was just goin' in my place," and he nodded to the door behind the counter, evidently his private domain, "when he come in. I nearly stepped out again, tell him about Fuller, and then I figured what the hell. But he ain't been out today."

  Climbing the creaky old bare stairs, Higgins thought they might as well shove this in Pending now and stop wasting time on it; they were never going to get anywhere. He went down the hall and rapped on Gillespie's door. Almost at once it opened. Gillespie was a short spare man with a bald head.

  "Mr. Gillespie?"

  "Yes?" he said in a quiet voice.

  Higgins reached for his badge. "I'd like to ask you a few questions—"

  Gillespie slammed the door in his face, and ten seconds later there was a loud crack from behind it. "My God!" said Higgins, stupefied.

  Landers came pounding up the stairs. "Was that a shot? What—"

  "Nearly gave me a heart attack. What the hell?" They tried the door and it opened. Across the bed lay the short spare body of Mr. Gillespie; he had shot himself in the head, and he was dead. The gun had fallen out of his hand; it was an old Hi-Standard .22.

  The manager came running. "Was that a shot? Oh, my God!"

  "Ten years off my life," said Higgins. But of course, maybe it solved their little mystery. When Marx and Horder got there, to take the routine pictures, he asked, "Did the morgue send over the slug from the other one here on Tuesday? Have you looked at it? Well, was it a twenty-two?"

  "George," said Marx, "you saw the corpse. Does a twenty-two blow off half a man's head? It was a three fifty-seven magnum."

  "That just makes all of this more confusing," said Higgins. They went back to the office and told Mendoza that the little mystery had escalated, and what had happened.

  "Just run through that once more . . . Well, I can only think you both need a vacation, George. The manager told you that Gillespie hadn't heard about Fuller yet, didn't know there were police around, about that. You march up to him and show him a badge, say you want to ask questions. Obvio, he thought you were after him. He's probably wanted somewhere. Ask NCIC."

  "Damn it, that never— Of course."

  "You don't realize," said Mendoza, "what an intimidating fellow you are, is all."

  * * *

  Higgins got home that Friday night just as the light was fading; next month they'd be on daylight saving and he'd be home before dark. The little Scotty Brucie came to meet him as he shut the garage door, and he went into the kitchen to find Mary at the stove. He kissed her and she said, "Reasonably good day?"

  "A funny day," said Higgins. "Some pretty peculiar things are happening on the job lately, if you ask me. I think I'll have a drink before dinner. I had a little shock this afternoon." And hearing his voice, Steve Dwyer came out of his room; he had shot up another inch in the last couple of months, and looked more like Bert than ever.

  "Hey, George, look at the great shots I got of that sunset over the mountains, that new filter is really something."

  Margaret Emily was playing on the living-room floor with a big stuffed dog, and Laura was practicing the piano, loud. But her teacher said she was some kind of musical genius so they had to put up with it.

  Hi
ggins went to build himself a drink before he admired Steve's pictures.

  * * *

  "Well, it might be fun," said Roberta. "I got all this literature from the local obedience club today. She's really pretty good." They looked at the big black German shepherd Trina on the floor between them. Roberta had just come back from tucking the baby into bed. "I never saw the sense of regular dog shows, but the obedience thing, to show how intelligent they are, that's interesting. The show's in June, in Pasadena. I can work with her a lot more in the meantime. And the entrance fee's only ten dollars for the novice class."

  "Go ahead." Palliser smiled at her.

  "Would you like that, girl? Like to go to the show and have everybody see how smart you are?" Trina thumped her tail enthusiastically.

  "If she does take first prize it'll be all your doing, you're the one who's trained her."

  "The only thing is, it's on a Sunday and you couldn't come. How much seniority do you have to have to get Sundays off?"

  "It goes by rote, you know that. Just be thankful I'm not on night watch. Rich Conway is damned annoyed about that, but maybe it'll settle him down some."

  She laughed. "Well, the bride and groom will be back soon. She seemed very nice, I do hope they'll be happy."

  "We'll be damned glad to have Nick back," said Palliser feelingly.

  * * *

  The woman at the hospital, the only one who'd survived the hit-run, was Mrs. Margarita Patillo. She had a broken leg and a sprained wrist, and she'd been knocked out with a concussion, but now she could be talked to. They had her propped up a little, with the leg in traction, and she looked quite alert and sensible, if her face was drawn with grief. She was a woman in her forties, still attractive. There was a man about the same age sitting beside the bed when Conway came in. "Oh, I'll go out," he said when Conway introduced himselt

  "Not on my account, sir, I just want to ask Mrs. Patillo what she can tell us about the accident."