Survival of the Fittest

by Jonathan Kellerman

  “The whole thing amazes me,” she said. “Being tied into a possible serial. Because ours wasn't even a murder, just an iffy suicide. Not iffy enough to change the coroner's verdict, so we closed it as a suicide. But when I saw your memo . . .”

  Shaking her head, she pushed the malt aside and dabbed at her lips. The lipstick she left on the straw had brown overtones. The black in her hair was real. She was probably closer to thirty than twenty-five, but not a line on her face.

  “Who was the victim?” I said.

  “A twenty-nine-year-old scientist named Malcolm Ponsico. Cellular physiologist, recent Ph.D. from CalTech, supposed to be some kind of genius. He lived in Pasadena, but was working at a research lab on Sunset near Vermont— Hospital Row— and that's where he did it so it was our case.”

  “I used to work at Western Peds,” I said.

  “Right there. Two blocks up. Place called PlasmoDerm, they do skin research, developing synthetic grafts for burn victims, that kind of thing. Ponsico's specialty was cell membranes. He killed himself with an injection of potassium chloride— the stuff they use for lethal-injection executions. Did it while working late, the cleaning lady found him at 4:00 A.M., slumped over his lab table. Big laceration right here, where his head hit the edge.”

  She traced a line over well-formed black brows.

  “He fell on his head when he died?”

  “That's how the coroner saw it.”

  “Where's the DVLL tie-in?”

  “He left it typed on his computer screen. Four letters, right in the middle of the screen. Stu— Detective Bishop— and I figured it for something technical, a formula. But we asked around, just to be careful, in case it was some kind of coded suicide note. No one at PlasmoDerm knew what it meant and it didn't show up in any of Ponsico's computer files— we had one of our data-processing guys check them out. All numbers, formulas. No one seemed surprised by Ponsico writing something only he understood. He was that kind of guy— major brain in a world of his own.”

  “Did he leave a message at his home?”

  “No. His apartment was in perfect order. Everyone said he was a nice person, quiet, kept to himself, really into his work. No one had noticed him being depressed and his parents in New Jersey said he'd seemed okay when he called them. But parents often say that. People hide things, right?”

  “He seemed okay?” I said. “That's not a ringing endorsement of his happiness.”

  “His parents said he'd always been a serious boy. Their word— boy. A genius, they'd always let him do his own thing and he'd always produced. Their word, too. They're both professors. I got the feeling it was a high-pressure household. It played out pure suicide. Ponsico's prints were all over the hypodermic and the potassium vial and the coroner said the position we found him in was consistent with self-infliction. Said also it was a fairly quick death— massive heart attack, though Ponsico could have made things easier on himself if he'd taken a tranquilizer like the ones they give Death Row guys. Then again, no one from the ACLU was looking over Ponsico's shoulder.”

  “So what was iffy about it?”

  “Ponsico's former girlfriend— another scientist at the lab, named Sally Branch— was convinced there was something wrong and kept calling us up, asking us to keep snooping. She said it didn't make sense, Ponsico had no reason to kill himself, she'd have known if there were something wrong.”

  “Even though she was a former girlfriend.”

  “My thought exactly, Doctor. And she also tried to cast suspicion on Ponsico's new girlfriend, so we figured it was jealousy. Then I met the new girlfriend and wondered.”

  She took a sip of water.

  “Her name was Zena Lambert and she was weird. She'd worked as a clerk at PlasmoDerm but left a few months before Ponsico's death.”

  “Weird, how?” I said.

  “Kind of . . . nerdy— but in a mean way. Snippy. As in, I'm smarter than you so don't waste my time. Even though she claimed to be grieving over Ponsico.”

  “An intellectual snob?” I said.

  “Exactly. Which was funny because Sally Branch, with her Ph.D., was down-to-earth, and here was this clerk who thought she was the end-all. Still, a bad personality doesn't make someone a suspect and we had absolutely nothing on her.”

  “Did Sally Branch give some reason for suspecting Zena?”

  “She said Ponsico changed noticeably after he started dating her— even quieter, less social, hostile. All of which seemed logical to me. He'd be less social with Sally because he'd broken up with her.”

  “Did she say why he broke up with her?”

  “All Zena. To listen to her, Zena swooped down like some harpy and stole him away. She also said Zena had gotten him into some kind of high-IQ club and he'd become obsessed with his intelligence. Big-time arrogant. But that was it, evidence-wise, and she gave me no motive for Zena wanting to hurt him. Eventually, I just stopped taking her calls. Now, Milo's told me about these DVLL murders, someone getting rid of retarded people, maybe a tie-in with genetic cleansing, so I have to wonder about that high-IQ group.”

  She shook her head. “Though I still can't see any connection to Ponsico, unless he met your killer at the brainiac club and learned too much for his own good.”

  “Did Zena get anothor job after she left PlasmoDerm?” I said.

  “Bookstore in Silverlake, it's in the file.”

  “Did Sally give you a name for the club?” I said, thinking about Nolan Dahl, another high-IQ suicide.

  “Meta,” she said. “You really think there could be a link?”

  I told the two of them what I'd learned in the library.

  “Survival of the rotten,” she said. “Reminds me of something my father once told me. He was a professor in Arizona, physical anthropologist, did research on wolves, the desert. He said there was a giant study going on— the Human Genome Project— mapping every gene in the human body, trying to figure out which traits are caused by what. The ultimate goal is to collect detailed data on every one of us. My dad said the upside potential for medical research was tremendous but it was also frightening. What if insurance companies got hold of the information and decided to withhold coverage because of some mutation way back in the family tree? Or companies started refusing to hire someone because they were at elevated risk for cancer ten years down the line?”

  “Or,” said Milo, “Big Bro identifies the mutations and kills off the carriers . . . was PlasmoDerm involved in that kind of research?”

  “No, just skin grafts, but even if they were, it doesn't explain why Ponsico would kill himself.”

  “Maybe he found out he had some incurable disease.”

  “Nope, the coroner said he was perfectly healthy.”

  Milo pulled out his pad. “Meta. Sounds like Greek.”

  “It is,” said Petra. “I went over the file before I came here and looked it up. Means change, transformation. Something that breaks new ground.”

  “Brave new goddamn world?” said Milo. “A bunch of arrogant geeks sit around theorizing about improving the species and one of them decides to put it into action?”

  Both of them looked at me.

  “Sure,” I said. “If you thought you were that superior, you might start figuring the rules didn't apply.”

  Out in the parking lot, Connor said, “I spoke to Stu this morning. He won't be back from Maui for another week, says to give you all our data.”

  She produced a file from a huge black bag and handed it to Milo.

  “Thanks, Petra.”

  “No problem.” She flashed an abrupt white smile. “Just promise that if I send around a memo, you'll read it.”

  We watched her drive away in an older black Accord.

  “Fairly new on the job,” said Milo, “but she'll go far. . . . So I guess the next step is for me to go over this, then give you a look. Then have a talk with Ponsico's two girlfriends.”

  “It's the best lead we've gotten, so far,” I said. Saying nothing about Nolan b
ecause I was still bound by confidentiality and there was no reason to violate.

  We walked to the Seville. “Thanks for the library work, Alex. Have time to go back there and look up this Meta outfit?”

  “First thing in the morning. Sharavi's well-equipped in the computer department. Planning to update him?”

  “Haven't decided. Because anything I tell him goes straight to Carmeli and how much do I want a grieving high-powered father to know at this point . . . not that I can put him off too long— hell, if I don't cue him in, he'll probably start bugging the phones again.”

  He laughed, cursed. “Distractions . . . by the way, I think I figured out how Sharavi got Raymond Ortiz's shoes. Same way he got the file— remember how the first time Manny Alvarado looked for it he couldn't find it? Seems a former Newton captain just happened to drop in to visit the station a couple days before. Guy named Eugene Brooker, one of the highest-ranked blacks in the department, they used to think he was on his way to deputy chief. But his wife died last summer and he retired. And guess what— he was a biggie on the same Olympics security Sharavi worked on. So the Israelis are connected to the department, who knows where else. No matter how aboveboard Sharavi acts, I'll always figure he's holding something back. You think his computers can help substantially?”

  “I can get academic references from the library, material that's been in the English-language press. But if Meta's an international group, or if it's been implicated in anything criminal overseas, he could be useful.”

  He thought about that. “All this assumes Meta's some big deal. For all we know, it's just a group of nerds getting together for chips and dip, patting themselves on the back because God gave them smarts. Even if the killer's one of them, how're we going to pick him out of the group?”

  “If there's a membership roster and we get it, we could cross-check with the sex-offender and M.O. files. We can also see if any members present a clear opportunity or motive for the three killings. Like working at the park where Raymond was abducted and/or the conservancy.”

  “Park worker with a high IQ?”

  “Underachiever,” I said. “That's the way I've seen it all along.”

  “Ponsico's second girlfriend— the Lambert woman— sounds like an underachiever, too. Clerking. Not that she's any big suspect, because our boy's definitely male and strong— the way he carried Irit and Raymond, trussed up Latvinia.”

  I got in the car. He said, “What do you think of that gene project Connor talked about?”

  “Just what we need in the age of kindness, Milo. Some map that determines whose life is worth living.”

  “So you're not willing to depend upon the good graces of intellectuals and insurance companies, huh?”

  I laughed. “Gang bangers and dope smugglers and back-alley junkie muggers, maybe. But no, not them.”

  31

  At 6:00 A.M. after working since midnight, Daniel opened the shutters on the computer room's windows and breathed in light.

  Putting on his phylacteries, he prayed without feeling, looking out at the tiny backyard clad in concrete.

  He'd spent most of the night on the phone, accommodating the European and Asian and Middle Eastern time zones. Making police-officer small talk in four languages, calling in favors, making his way through the various law-enforcement bureaucracies that somehow never changed from city to city.

  Searching for DVLL references, murders with racial and ethnic overtones, any hints of serial crimes linked to genetic cleansing, any major changes in the policies of neo-Nazi and nationalist groups and others who thought themselves superior.

  Quantity wasn't the problem. Plenty of information— as democracy spread over Europe, more and more lunatics crawled out of their holes and gorged themselves on free speech. But in the end he was left with no connections to the L.A. murders, nothing even close to a lead.

  He cut his prayers short, apologized to God, wrapped up the tfillin, and went into the small, dark bathroom where he turned on the shower, stripped, and stepped in, not waiting for the water to turn hot.

  It took exactly two minutes forty-one seconds for the old pipes to kick in. He'd timed it yesterday, arranged his morning schedule accordingly.

  But this morning he endured the cold needles.

  Flogging himself for the futile night?

  He'd begun with Heinz-Dietrich Halzell at the Berlin police, who'd informed him the racist presses continued to churn out the nasty stuff; the moment the polizei got an injunction, the slime just moved and started up again. And stupid punks kept beating up Turks and anyone else with a dark skin, starting brawls, desecrating graveyards.

  Apology in his voice. Deeply sorry, the way only a German could be. Daniel had hosted him at a security conference in Jerusalem, last year. A really decent guy, but weren't they always the ones who let themselves feel?

  Murders of retarded kids? No, Heinz-Dietrich hadn't heard of anything like that. DVLL? Not in any of their files, but he'd ask around. What was going on in L.A.?

  When Daniel told him, sketchily, he sighed and said he'd ask around seriously.

  Uri Drori at the Israeli Embassy in Berlin did some double-checking and verified everything Halzell had said. Daniel called him not because he didn't trust the German, but because sometimes what you learned depended on who you were.

  Drori reported a slowly escalating rate of low-level incidents, repeated almost word for word Heinz-Dietrich's lament about the idiots popping up like toadstools.

  It will never end, Dani. The more democracy you have, the more you get this shit, but what's the alternative?

  Same story with Bernard Lamont in Paris, Joop Van Gelder in Amsterdam, Carlos Velasquez in Spain, all the others.

  No murders of defectives, no DVLL.

  Which didn't really surprise him. These crimes seemed American. Though he couldn't explain why.

  A wonderful country, America. Huge and free and naive; big-hearted people always willing to grant the benefit of the doubt.

  Even after the Trade Center bombing, you didn't see large-scale anti-Muslim feelings. The Israeli Embassy in New York tracked that kind of thing.

  Free country.

  But what was the price?

  Last night, taking a coffee break, he'd heard police sirens, loud, close, looked out the same rear window and saw a helicopter circling low, beaming down on backyards, like some giant mantis scouting for prey.

  His police scanner told him they were searching for an armed-robbery suspect— holdup at Beverly Drive and Pico.

  A mile away, right near Zev Carmeli's place.

  Not far from the house on Monte Mar where Laura had grown up. Her parents had sold it and bought two tiny condos. Beverly Hills, and Jerusalem, where they were now.

  Before he'd left for the States, his father-in-law had warned him: Be careful, things have changed.

  Gene said, Total breakdown, Danny Boy. Going to school can be hazardous to a kid's health.

  Which was one reason Gene had sold his big house in Lafayette Park. Heading for Arizona . . . no real reason for Arizona, except that it was warm and “I'm not exactly worried about melanoma, right?”

  Gene looked old. Since Luanne's death, his hair and mustache had turned snow-white and his skin bagged.

  An untimely death, the poor woman had been only sixty when the massive stroke had knocked her to the floor of her kitchen. Gene discovering her, another reason to sell the house.

  High blood pressure. A doctor friend of Daniel's told him blacks had more of it. Some said it was their diet, others genetics. His friend thought racism had a lot to do with it.

  Daniel understood that. He couldn't count the times he'd been called a dirty Jew by Arabs and, because of his skin, a nigger by all sorts of people.

  When it happened, he didn't react visibly but his heart pounded in his ears . . . he wondered if Gene was taking care of his diabetes. Cookies on the counter when he'd gone there to pick up the Ortiz file and the boy's shoes said otherwise.


  His friend had come through for him and Daniel liked to think the favor had been good for Gene, too.

  Nothing but time on his hands, poor guy. He'd called three times since returning the stuff, offering to do whatever Daniel needed.

  But Daniel wouldn't go to Gene for any more favors. The man was ill, no reason to draw him in deeper.

  If Sturgis cooperated.

  He'd said he would, but hard to tell.

  Sturgis would never score high on the Trust Index.

  He stepped out of the shower just as the water warmed up, dried off, goose-bumped, amazed he hadn't felt any discomfort.