by Bill Bernico
“I don’t know that one, but this one.” He held onto the second photo. “This boy I know. He’s a regular customer here. He brings his bicycle in several times a month for repairs. I used to wonder if my repairs weren’t as good as they used to be and then I saw him riding it one day in the park. I think it was on a Sunday. Anyway, he and some other kids were jumping them up the curb and pulling back on the handlebars until they were riding on just the rear wheel. Of course they fell over a lot until they got the hang of it. Boy, how they abuse those beautiful bikes. It’s no wonder I have to fix them regularly.” He handed the second photo back to Matt.
“Can you tell me his name?” Matt said.
“Certainly,” Lloyd said. “Just give me a second.” He stepped behind the counter to a file cabinet and pulled open the second drawer, withdrawing a repair order. Lloyd handed the sheet to Matt. “That’s him.”
Matt pulled a pen from his pocket and turned the photo over, copying the name from the work order. He had one name now and the second wouldn’t be that hard to get once Matt confronted this kid. He thanked Lloyd and left the store. Back in his car, Matt called Lieutenant Cole again.
“Kevin, I have a name, but he might be a juvenile. Can you still check your records to see if he’s in there?”
“I could,” Kevin said, “but we wouldn’t be able to use anything in it for a conviction. He’d be underage and his record, if he has one, would be sealed.”
“Could you at least see if he’s in there and if there are any other names of associates who might be of legal age?”
“Good idea,” Kevin said. “Where are you now?”
“I’m in the parking lot at Western and Santa Monica. I didn’t want to drive all the way back to the twelfth precinct if I can get what I need over the phone.”
“Let me call you back,” Kevin said. “Give me your cell number.”
Matt gave Kevin his cell phone number and told him it might be a good idea if he kept the number handy somewhere or perhaps even added it to his own cell phone’s contact list. Matt closed his phone and sat back, studying the photos from the supermarket. These photos were less than a week old and both suspects looked like they could be old enough to take responsibility for their actions. Just because one of them still rode a bike didn’t mean he wasn’t old enough to know better. He’d seen plenty of guys just a few years younger than himself who were still riding around on those twenty-inch stunt bikes. He used to look at them and wonder why they hadn’t grown out of that stage. Then he read about one stunt bike rider who was only twenty-two and making a six-figure income.
Kevin called back eight minutes later. “Got him,” he said. “His name is Jason Calvert and the little punk just celebrated his eighteenth birthday last month. His sorry ass is up for grabs. Check him out, but step lightly. Don’t want to spook him or his buddy if they find out we’re on to them.”
“We don’t even know if these two guys had anything to do with the overpass accidents,” Matt said. “So far, all they’re guilty of is being a couple of clumsy klutzes who dropped a carton of eggs in the supermarket. I’ll need more to connect them to anything else.”
“Well, if you do, call me and we’ll handle it from there,” Kevin insisted. “We don’t want them slipping through the cracks of justice on any technicalities.”
“Will do,” Matt said. “Gotta run. I’ll check back in with you later.”
Matt dropped his phone back into his pocket and drove to the address Kevin had given him for Jason Calvert. The house fell just outside the perimeter of the nine-block area for the accidents but it was still close enough that the freeway overpass could still be accessed by bicycle. If that was the case, however, Matt wondered how Calvert could manage to pedal a bicycle and carry a carton of eggs at the same time. That brought Matt’s thoughts back to the possibility of the accomplice, who could have used a car to get around.
Matt passed the famous front gates at Paramount Studios and rounded the corner at Windsor and Melrose heading south. Calvert lived just two blocks further south, but still lived close enough to both accident sites to make him a viable suspect. As Matt got close to the address, he could see a young man on a short bicycle pedaling out of the driveway and heading south. Matt slowed his car and stayed a respectable distance behind the kid on the bike.
The bicyclist turned east on Clinton and Matt stayed with him, occasionally stopping to put more distance between them when he got too close. The kid turned south on Bronson and then rode his bike up into the third driveway on his left. Matt continued past the house but pulled to the curb several houses away. He made a note of the address and then waited. A few minutes later the kid came out of the house, followed by another, apparently older kid, who walked to the curb and got into an older red two door coupe.
The two men drove right past Matt as he sat there. Matt gave them a little space and then pulled in behind them. The car continued south on Bronson until it came to Beverly Boulevard, where it turned east. Matt knew there was another Hollywood Freeway overpass at Vermont Avenue. If these two were the egg throwing troublemakers, they were certainly stepping up their game by hitting another overpass this close to the last one in both time and distance.
Matt followed as the red coupe turned north on Vermont only to turn west two blocks later. It parked just around the corner on Rosewood, which was walking distance to the freeway overpass. Matt slowed, giving them a larger lead before turning onto Rosewood himself. The two young men were just getting out of the coupe when Matt drove past them. He noticed one of them was carrying a plastic shopping bag with something in it. The two of them walked back toward Vermont Avenue and disappeared around the corner.
Matt got out of his car and walked up to the red coupe. He had a gut feeling about those two and figured this was the perfect opportunity to make sure they didn’t have a quick getaway if and when they caused more chaos on the freeway. Matt lifted the hood, located the distributor wire and pulled it off, dropping it into his pocket before following the two men on foot.
Walking north on Vermont, Matt could see the two men ahead of him. They were walking on the overpass now and had stopped mid-way to look over the rail. He watched as one of the men reached into the bag, pulling out something that Matt couldn’t see. Whatever it was, there must have been two of them, because the car’s driver handed one of the items to Calvert. The two of them looked around them at the traffic and then back over the rail. Before Matt could get to them, they both tossed something down onto the oncoming cars in the southbound lanes and then quickly walked back toward Matt’s position.
A few seconds later Matt heard the unmistakable sound of tires squealing, glass breaking and metal crunching. Matt stood where he was and turned away from the scene. He figured it would be easier to let the two of them come past the spot where he stood, rather than try to chase them down. A few more seconds later the two men walked past Matt and back toward the corner. As they passed, Matt called out, “Hold it right there, both of you.”
In an instant the car’s driver turned and pushed Matt to the sidewalk and ran as fast as they could back toward the car. Matt got to his feet and gave chase. As he rounded the corner he could see the two men scrambling back into the red couple. He could hear the engine turning over, trying to start. Matt pulled the distributor wire from his pocket and held it in his left hand, while his right held the .38 that had hung under his arm. He walked up to the driver’s window and rapped on it with the distributor wire.
“It runs much better with this attached,” Matt said, now pointing his revolver at the driver. Both men put their hands in the air and just sat there. Matt pulled at the door handle and the driver’s door swung open. “Both of you, get out and keep your hands where I can see ‘em.”
Both men complied as Matt nudged them toward the sidewalk. He threw the distributor wire on the hood of the car and pulled his cell phone out, dialing Lieutenant Cole’s number. Kevin answered on the second ring.
“Kevin,” Matt sa
id. “Did your department get any calls just now about another accident on the Hollywood Freeway?”
“How’d you know about that already?” Kevin said.
“Because I saw who did it this time and I have them here in front of me. You want to get over here and take them off my hands?” He gave Kevin his location, closed his phone and dropped it back into his pocket. He turned back to the two men on the sidewalk. “You both might as well get comfortable until the cavalry gets here. Come on, on your knees.”
The two men dropped to their knees, keeping their fingers interlaced behind their heads.
Matt looked at them and smiled, shaking his head in disbelief. “You guys aren’t too bright, are you?” he said, mostly to the driver.
“We didn’t do nothin’,” the driver said. “You got nothin’ on us.”
Matt produced the supermarket video printouts and held them in front of Calvert’s face. “You ever hear that old joke where two guys are talking about some homely girl? You know, where one guy tells the other guy that some girl had a bad case of zackly? The second guy shrugs like he doesn’t know what the first guy means. The first guy explains that her face looked zackly like her ass.
Calvert starts to laugh but then realizes the predicament he’s in and stops laughing.
Matt tosses the printouts at Calvert’s feet and says, “Well, you both have a bad case of zackly…your faces look egg zakly like the ones on the supermarket video. If you hadn’t dropped that first carton of eggs, no one would have given you two a second look and now look what you’ve got. You’re not kids anymore and what you two hoodlums did this week is going to get you both a stretch in prison. And you’d both better hope that no one was killed in this last accident you caused.
Twelve minutes later Lieutenant Kevin Cole pulled up in the street, his red lights flashing. Another black and white unit pulled up behind him. Two uniformed officers got out and came over to where the two suspects knelt. They pulled the two men to their feet and slapped a pair of cuffs on each of them. One of the officers pulled both of the suspects’ wallets from their pockets and handed them to Kevin.
Kevin opened the first wallet to the driver’s license window but didn’t find any license. He did, however, find a state-issued I.D. card in the name of Jason Calvert, age eighteen. The second wallet, that of the driver of the red coupe, yielded a driver’s license in the name of Benjamin Costello, age twenty. He handed the wallets back to one of the officers, who pocketed them and led the suspects back to the patrol car. “Take them down to the station,” Kevin said. “I’ll be down in a minute to process them.”
“Yes, sir,” the officer said before sliding behind the wheel of his patrol car and driving off.
Matt pointed to the back seat of the red coupe. “You’ll find a plastic grocery bag with a partial carton of eggs in it. Did you find out if anyone got hurt in this last accident?” He holstered his .38 and buttoned his jacket over it.
Kevin shook his head. “Four-car pileup. At least two dead. What a mess, and for what?”
“What’s this world coming to?” Matt said. “Of all the things there are to do in this city and this is how they have to get their kicks.”
“Hard to figure,” Kevin said. “Thanks for the assist, Matt. I’ll make sure you don’t have to wait until the end of the month to get your check. You saved us a lot of work on this one.”
“Glad to do it,” Matt said. “Now, if there’s nothing else, I’d like to drop in on Mom and see how she’s doing.”
“I’m going to need your eyewitness statement before the day’s out,” Kevin reminded Matt.
“I’ll be there before you leave for the day,” Matt assured him. “Just let me check on Mom first.” Matt got back into his car and drove toward his parents’ house.
Gloria was in the kitchen when Matt arrived. He let himself in and found Elliott standing behind Gloria, his arms wrapped around Gloria’s stomach and his mouth nuzzling her ear. “Oops,” Matt said, backing out onto the stoop again.
Elliott spun around and laughed while Gloria straightened out her sweater and arranged her hair back over her ear. Elliott let Matt in again.
“I guess I should have knocked,” Matt said, looking at Elliott. “So how was the fishing?”
“Skip the fishing,” Elliott said. “Tell me about your case. Your mother said something about it being a good one.”
“It was all right, as cases go,” Matt said, downplaying his part in it. “We caught the two troublemakers and it looks like they’ll be facing some hard time.”
“Another accident?” Gloria said.
Matt nodded and then looked at the floor. “Two dead this time in a four-car pileup.
All three of them were silent now for a moment before Matt turned to Gloria and said, “How’s the tooth?”
Gloria smiled a broad smile, showing off her temporary replacement. “I’ll have to make do with this for another ten days or so until I can get the actual bridge installed.”
“Did you learn your lesson?” Matt said.
“Huh?” Gloria said.
“Pistachios,” Matt explained. “I suppose you’ll be giving them up after this.”
“Not totally,” Gloria said.
Elliott gestured to the blender that sat on the kitchen counter. I found a way to blend pistachios in that thing. I just add a spoonful of vegetable oil with the pistachios and it comes out kind of like peanut butter.”
“Pistachio butter?” Matt said.
“Maybe I’ll get a patent on it,” Elliott said.
“I don’t think so, Dad,” Matt said. “You know how many pistachios you’d have to blend to get enough butter for one sandwich? I’d say a fair guess would be somewhere around fifty or sixty. And with the price of a single bag of pistachios, one sandwich could end up costing you five or six bucks.”
“Skip that idea?” Elliott said.
“Egg zackly,” Matt said.
Even Elliott had to groan at that one.
136 - Double Take
It was a crisp fall morning when Matt Cooper, the sole proprietor at Cooper Investigations walked away from the pretzel stand with a warm, fat pretzel wrapped in a napkin. He bit into it as he walked back toward his office on the corner of Hollywood and Cahuenga. He was still more than a block away when a woman stopped him on the street and laid her hand on his shoulder.
“Matt?” she said. “Matt Cooper? I thought that was you.”
Matt pointed at her with his free hand. “I, uh, you…” He was at a loss for her last name. “Anne.”
She nodded. “Anne Hoffsted,” she said.
Matt snapped his fingers. “I’d have gotten it in another few seconds. My mind was distracted by this tasty pretzel. What are you doing on the boulevard?”
“Probably the same as you,” she said. “Heading back to work. By the way, Matt, what are you doing with yourself these days?”
Matt gestured with his pretzel up the street. “I run Cooper Investigations just up the block.” He looked at Anne’s fancy clothes. And what about you? Where are you working these days, at a fashion show?”
She gestured toward her formal attire. “Oh this? I just came from a friend’s funeral. You remember Mrs. Gunderson, don’t you?”
“Gunderson, Gunderson,” Matt said, trying to recall. He shook his head.
“Our fourth grade music teacher,” Anne offered. “Gees, she was ancient when we had her.”
“And she just died?” Matt said. “How old was she, anyway?”
“She was eighty-two; well, almost eighty-three. She missed her birthday by three weeks.”
“Wish I’d known,” Matt said. “I would have been there.”
“Really?” Anne seemed surprised. “If I remember correctly, you didn’t really like her. Why was that?”
Matt shrugged and spread his hands. “She made me stay after school one day when I really wanted to be playing baseball with my friends.”
“That’s it?”
“Plus, she m
ade me write on the blackboard five hundred times, ‘I will not talk during study period.’ That seemed to take forever.”
“And?”
“And what?” Matt said innocently.
“I’ve heard this story before,” Anne said. “I’d like to hear your side of it.”
Matt rolled his eyes. “When she left the room I found the staff liner she’d left lying on her desk.”
Anne was already laughing. She’d seen that wood and wire contraption that held five pieces of chalk simultaneously. It was used to draw musical staffs on the blackboard.
“Anyway,” Matt continued, “it already had the five pieces of chalk in the holders so I picked it up and wrote, ‘I will not talk during study period’ with it across the board. I was able to write it five times with each pass. I figured I could be out of there in record time. Problem was she came back into the room while I was using it. I found out later that she purposely left it where I could find it. Seems I wasn’t the first kid to see the potential of that little gadget.”
“I’ll bet she made you wipe the board clean and start over, didn’t she?” Anne said.
“Not only that, she took my original piece of chalk and broke it in half. I had to do those five hundred lines with a stubby piece of chalk. I had chalk dust under my nails for a week after that.”
“And you’ve been carrying that grudge all these years?” Ann said.
“I have to admit,” Matt said, “I’ve mellowed over the past eighteen years since that traumatic incident. I can actually laugh about it these days.” Matt paused a moment and then remembered Mrs. Gunderson. “I guess she wasn’t so bad after all.”
Anne checked her watch and then looked up at Matt. “Say, listen, it was nice to see you again, but I really have to be heading back to work. You stay in touch now, you hear?”
Matt started to open his mouth with the next obvious question.
Anne anticipated it and said, “I’m in the book under Hoffsted.”
“You never married?”
“That’s another story for another time,” Anne said, hurrying off down the street.