Aimee
Nice. As I started reading the PDF, I realized that this was going to take all my concentration. I put the depleted tray on the floor, let Bardot in under the covers, and went to work. An hour later, I was still reading.
Chapter 13
“Would you pass the edamame, please?”
I handed the dish of steamed soybeans drizzled with salt and sesame oil down the table to Penelope. Sally and Peggy were discussing the merits of fish-and-chips over crab cakes. By this time they had shared various versions of last night’s escapades.
We were having lunch at Tony P’s overlooking the Marina; I’d called an emergency meeting after I finished reading the files Aimee had sent me. I wasn’t quite sure how to process this new information and was anxious to hear what the group had to say. I’d left Paula out on purpose because I didn’t want her opinion clouding what her husband Max had written. Plus, she’s a little odd, especially when food is involved.
She’s vegan unless baby back ribs are being served. Or steak. A filet, to be exact. She does eat every sort of vegetable, but don’t try and tempt her with tofu, regardless of how it’s prepared. She calls it the “devil’s discard.” And Paula I suspect has never been on the fence in her life. She either likes things or abhors them.
As soon as I’d ordered my Creole steamed mussels, I began.
“Max’s paper is a detailed chronological history of Mar Vista and particularly the hill. According to Max, it seems that people have been speculating about the grounds where the community gardens and the surrounding neighborhoods sit long past the oil rush of the thirties. Numerous attempts have been made as close as ten years ago to locate a source and tap it. This paper Max was working on was written sometime in 2014, but I have no idea how long ago he started his research,” I explained.
“So do you think that people are still trying to find oil up there?” Sally asked, dipping a chip in malt vinegar.
“I haven’t seen any evidence of that, but it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist,” I replied. “Also let’s not forget this sudden interest people and developers have with putting in basements. What I fell into at the construction site was not just mud. It had a sulfur-like smell and a gooey consistency.”
“So what would happen if they found oil?” Penelope asked. “Would oil derricks be popping up like mushrooms after a good rain?”
“First of all we haven’t had a good rain in over three hundred days,” Peggy said, “and secondly the real rush would be from the greedy ones who would beg, borrow, steal, and kill for the mineral rights.”
“Bingo, that would explain why Mr. Bobby Snyder, Esq. is suddenly a fixture on Rose Avenue.”
I looked at Sally, she had a point but this wasn’t making things clearer, quite the opposite. And I hadn’t dropped the real bomb yet.
“Well, be prepared to have your socks blown off,” I said, grabbing their undivided attention. “What I’m about to read to you was in the very last section of Max’s report. It almost seems as if he stopped writing in mid-sentence.”
I grabbed my iPad from my bag and took a healthy sip of iced tea. We hadn’t really considered ordering wine because we all had things to do after lunch, but once they hear this, minds may be changed.
“Some of this passage is quoted directly from the Herald-Express, a daily newspaper back then. Here was the headline: ‘Werewolf Strikes Again! Kills L.A. Woman, Writes B.D. on Body.’ I looked it up and apparently this happened soon after the ‘Black Dahlia’ murder.”
“This is all true? Not something Max had made up?” Sally asked, and I nodded.
“Here’s the kicker,” I said, and continued reading.
The victim of the “Werewolf Killer” was forty-five-year-old Jeanne French. Her nude body had been discovered at about eight a.m. on February 10, 1947 near Grand View Avenue and Indianapolis Street.
“This is pretty much center of where the baseball field is now,” I explained. “The body had been hidden under a pile of weeds.”
French had been savagely beaten, and her body was covered with bruises. She had suffered some blows to her head, probably administered by a metal blunt instrument—maybe a socket wrench. As bad as they were, the blows to her head had not been fatal. Jeanne died from hemorrhage and shock due to fractured ribs and multiple injuries caused by stomping—she had heel prints on her chest. It took a long time for French to die.
Jeanne’s estranged husband, Frank, was brought in on suspicion of murder. He was later cleared—
“The murder remains unsolved.”
Everyone took a breath and let this sink in. Suddenly no one was hungry. We watched a sailboat back out of its berth and maneuver into the main channel.
“One more thing,” I said.
“Sweet mother of triplets,” Sally swore.
“Last night as we were leaving the construction site, Augie told me that Abigail Rose’s autopsy report had come back. It said that she died of asphyxiation, smothered by the dirt of her grave. She was buried alive.”
* * *
“So they never found the ‘Werewolf Killer.’ You don’t think that Max had anything to do with this, he couldn’t have been more than a little shaver back in 1947,” Penelope summed up.
Peggy did the smart thing next and asked the waiter for a wine list.
“Agreed, and there may be no connection between this and Abigail’s murder,” I said. “But two dead bodies buried in the same area, what are the chances of that? Maybe Abigail’s murder was some sort of copycat slaying.”
“I wonder why Max stopped writing about this,” Sally asked. “Max is meticulous about facts and details; he would never give up on a story.”
“I’d say we could just ask Max or Paula about it, but that could just raise false suspicions or look like we are spying on him.” I stopped trying to read the dessert menu; I was having fruit, fermented fruit.
“Which is exactly what we are doing. Didn’t Paula say that she was going to pull some of his research together and give it to us?”
I nodded to Peggy.
“Well, when we get them, we can compare notes. See if he’d added more at a later date.”
“This could explain why Paula said that Max doesn’t want to talk about the study,” Peggy threw into the mix. “And if he was too young to have committed the first murder, maybe that’s where he got the idea of how to dispose of Abigail Rose?”
“But why would he need to get rid of the poor dear?” Penelope asked.
“Well, with all his research, he must have a pretty good idea if there’s oil to be found around us,” Sally replied. “And remember Paula told us that they owned the mineral rights under their property. Maybe Max came upon the trail of the deed. If you recall when he and Malcolm gave us their history lesson, Max ended by saying that he knew there was oil here because he’d seen it.”
“Let’s not forget about our friend Bobby Snyder. If somehow he knew about the existence of the deed, I’m guessing that he would do just about anything to get his hands on it,” Penelope concluded.
“Great, so the murderer could be Bobby Snyder, Malcolm, Howard the developer, Paula’s husband Max, or none of the above. I hate it when they do this in books, and I like it even less when it happens in real life,” I said.
* * *
The next two days were spent working on some additions to the Coast Guard’s website; I actually welcomed the break from the murder case. By the third day of coding, my brain hurt. I needed a distraction and Bardot and Jack were just the ones to provide it. We decided that we’d go on a beach run and romp early Saturday morning. Since summer hadn’t officially started, we figured that we’d have the place to ourselves and settled on the Venice sand just north of Marina del Rey. Jack brought his giant schnauzer, Clarence, the perfectly trained dog whose manners Bardot could unravel in under a minute.
After about an hour the sun started to rise behind us, the dogs were wet and sandy and Jack and I were in need of food and caffeine. It was times l
ike these when the beach is truly magical. As we sat on the cool sand and watched the waves, sounds of gulls and pelicans coming to life filled the air. The rich, briny smell of the sea got me thinking about oysters and scrambled eggs.
Less than an hour from now the boardwalk behind us would be transformed into the wacky carnival that tourists flock to year around. They will be able to get their fill of henna tattoos, watch a fearless man juggle running chainsaws, and listen to live music ranging from reggae to folk to beat-boxing. But for now as we headed toward sustenance, the only activity came from merchants rolling up metal doors to their stalls and moving out stands displaying their wares. I saw a rather weathered woman pulling out a tall revolving postcard rack and one of the pictures caught my eye.
It was a black-and-white photo of what looked like hundreds of oil wells on the beach just steps away from the shoreline in Venice Beach. When I turned the card over, the caption told me that this photo was taken in 1952. Smoke was billowing out of smaller buildings next to each well that must be driving the pumping. Jack looked at the image over my shoulder and then nodded his head slightly to the owner of the stall.
“Excuse me,” he started politely.
She had her back to us. “Not open yet. Come back in about an hour.”
“Of course; here, let me help you with that,” Jack said and lifted another postcard stand directly in the air and waited for her to tell him where she wanted it.
“Just there will do,” she said, finally looking at our smiling faces.
“We don’t want to disturb your set up; we—I just had a question about the photo on this postcard. We’ll come back later. May I get you a coffee or something?” I asked.
She took the postcard I was holding and gave it a long study. “Questions I always have time for, ’specially when it comes to the history of Venice. Most of the tourists these days only want to know if I’ve seen any of the Kardashians around, or some ask where they can score some weed. Like I would know.” She laughed.
I think you would.
“What was it that you wanted to know about this?”
“I’ve heard stories about people striking oil around here and was wondering how true they were and how long they’ve kept drilling,” I asked, treading lightly. She hid her hefty body under a caftan and her gray hair ran free. Her timeworn face told me that she could be anywhere from fifty to eighty.
“Aw hell, I know people today that swear they are one or two digs away from being rich. But this kind of stuff”—she pointed back to the postcard—“that stopped sometime in the nineties. The oil company gave the city about a half a million to clean up the beach but that didn’t even scratch the surface of the damage they’d done. Organizations like Heal the Bay do what they can but rely on volunteers and donations.”
“How long have you been working around here, Miss—?”
“Call me Sophie, handsome. And I appreciate the ‘miss’ part, but I could have taken this photo,” she replied.
“Nice to meet you, Sophie, I’m Halsey and this is Jack.”
The dogs, realizing that we were going to be here a while, had opted for a nap.
“Well, if you’re thinking about drilling for oil, just make sure that you’ve got all your t’s crossed and your i’s dotted.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Mineral rights, legal stuff. Deeds are king when it comes to oil.”
“Thank you, but we’re just curious about the history, that’s all. I know you’re getting ready to open, I’ll buy this card and we’ll let you get back to it.”
“Keep it, the postcard’s on me, but since you offered to get me something to drink, I’ll take a tall one. Cold this morning, I need something to take the edge off,” she said to Jack, as if he’d understand better than I would.
“You got it,” Jack said, running off.
Is that what he means when he says “breakfast of champions”?
Chapter 14
“What do you think Sophie’s story is?” I asked Jack over my eggs ranchero at Maxwell’s.
“Hmm, good question. Let me think for a minute.” Which translated meant, I’m going to enjoy my banana walnut pancakes, eggs, and sausage a while longer before I talk.
If we ran out of things to talk about, which was seldom, Jack and I loved to play a game that I call “scenario, please?” The way it worked is that you picked a person or couple wherever you are and challenged each other to come up with their story. Once one of us was done, the other could agree, elaborate, or change the story entirely. It was great for getting through airport flight delays and just fun in general.
“I’d say that Sophie is an old soul, and I don’t mean because her skin is like leather,” Jack finally began. “She’s like a ‘house mother’ to the Venice boardwalk sellers and performers, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she carries a deck of Tarot cards on her at all times.”
Damn, he’s good.
“I’d say that she’s been married two or three times, but the last ended over ten years ago even though they never bothered to get a divorce.” With that Jack began the thorough process of wiping his carefully cropped beard. He was a bit of a fanatic about having a clean, soft beard, which I greatly appreciated.
“Your turn,” he challenged me.
“I’m impressed, but you had to look past the loose dress to recognize that she had once been a crowd-gathering contortionist on the very same sidewalk where she now sells souvenirs. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s got a postcard or two with a photo of her in a pretzel-shaped pose from back in the day.”
“I should never go first, you can always add a zinger that I could never think of,” he said, applauding.
My cell phone rang and I saw that it was Augie.
“If it isn’t my favorite public servant,” I said into my phone.
“And hello to my most persistent suspect,” he answered back. “I wanted to bring you up to date; I’ve got good news and bad news.”
“Great,” I said as Jack paid our bill, and we stepped outside so I could put the call on speaker.
“We gave Howard the developer a thorough questioning and in the end let him go.”
“Is that the good news or the bad news?” I asked.
“Well, it’s good for him and bad for you.”
“Come on Augie, we’ve been all through this and you know I had nothing to do with that poor guy’s demise. What did you find out about him anyway?”
“His name was Carlos, Howard was about to fire him, the guy’s an angry drunk who also had a drug problem. It seems his wife left him and he never got over it.”
“Maybe if he’d cleaned up his little problems . . .”
“Yeah, well, he’s had a string of arrests, DUI. He was driving with a suspended license.”
“And how do you know that Howard didn’t kill him, maybe the firing didn’t go so well?”
“Because Howard was at a hockey game, courtesy of the lumberyard he does a lot of business with. It all checked out.”
“So who killed Carlos and what was he doing at the site so late at night?”
“I was about to ask you that, Halsey.”
“Very funny.”
“We’ll need the autopsy report to determine cause of death and that should help tell us where to go next. Also we need CSI’s report. Rumor has it that they found a couple gallon tanks of gasoline on the premises.”
“So maybe Carlos was about to carry out a grudge,” Jack said, and I nodded.
“But what or who stopped him?” I added.
“One other thing, has Aunt Marisol talked to you about the DNA test?”
“Is she pregnant again?” I asked, and Jack laughed. Augie did not.
“We got some interesting results on the test from the cigarette butt that this Bobby Snyder dropped. You know, the lawyer that’s trying to sell you all brokered mineral rights packages?”
“I know,” I said, thinking about what Sophie had just told me about “legal stuff.”
>
“It seems that his real name is Robert W. Snopes.”
“That’s why we couldn’t find any record of his law license,” I said aloud.
“He had one, if passing the bar in South Dakota the easiest test state counts. Records since he started practicing show that he’s basically a low-life ambulance chaser.”
“You said ‘had one,’ has he been disbarred?”
“Yes,” Augie told me. “He went down in style, having been caught stealing prescription pads from several doctors in a medical group. It seems that he was falsifying diagnoses for his clients in order to up claims on their accident and injury suits.”
“So why isn’t he serving time and providing legal advice to the fine citizens of federal prison?”
“You’ve met him, he’s a slimy one. He managed to worm his way into a significantly reduced sentence and parole, thanks to hefty bribes no doubt. But as far as the ABA was concerned, ‘stick a fork in him, he’s done.’ ”
“You’ve got to stop him, Augie, before he fools some nice old lady into giving him her life savings.”
“Believe me I stressed that to Auntie Marisol.”
“I said ‘nice old lady,’ Augie.”
“We’ll need something concrete in order to bring him in for questioning,” he said, ignoring my comment once again.
“We’re working on it,” I told him.
“Oh no you don’t, you and your band of winos need to stick to what you do best.”
“Which is what, Augie?”
“I haven’t figured that out yet.”
* * *
I spent the next couple of days hunkered down to the work that actually paid the bills. I got a web upgrade proposal off to my Coast Guard client, filled out a questionnaire for a possible new gig with the Santa Monica airport, and did things I’d been neglecting for good reason. Like getting my teeth cleaned, getting Bardot’s teeth cleaned, pulling out the patio furniture now that summer was on its way, and paring down Bardot’s pool toys from last year that were ratty and ready for retirement. I had to sneak out one night to toss “ducky,” a well-worn favorite, while she was asleep. She didn’t need to experience the trauma.
Murder Most Fermented Page 9