Dead Investigation

by Charlie Price

  Pearl noted his concern. “No. Seriously, what if dead things or even ordinary objects in our world contain bits of information? Maybe electro-chemical charges or patterns on the surface like, um, old fingerprints. Like stains from strong emotions that are created when we’re freaked out. Uh, like something could seep through our pores and get left behind when horrible things happen?” She paused and looked away, thinking. “Say a playground near where the Hiroshima bomb hit—couldn’t someone like Murray walk around there and still hear the screams? Or a rock that was used to hurt someone—couldn’t there be a remainder of the person’s noise and pain on its surface?”

  Janochek was dumbstruck. Good god, what’s my daughter doing now? “Hell in a horsecart, girl, where do you come up with these notions? Murray? Horror films? YouTube? I’ve never heard of such a thing. Never. What brought this up?”

  “Well, we talked about different kinds of energy in science class and I started wondering how come Murray hears new voices sometimes, even when he doesn’t really want to?”

  “Life is … strange, honey. Mysterious. Why do the atoms in our bodies combine and hold together to become a person? And after we die, those atoms disperse back into the universe. There’s so many things beyond our current understanding.” Janochek knew he was in over his head. He should probably just listen.

  “You know, I asked Murray to touch the cap I found that belonged to the homeless guy who used to sleep around here. The guy we bought the coat and sleeping bag for?”

  “The guy’s cap? The knit thing?”

  “He wouldn’t. Even though I told him clairvoyers can do that sort of thing. You know, touch somebody’s favorite ballpoint and tell where they’re hiding?”

  Janochek felt like he’d missed the first hundred miles of highway on this particular trip. “Hold on. Um, you asked Murray to touch a cap so he could tell you where the man that’s probably been sleeping around here a few nights has gone, so you could give the old fellow the things we bought?”

  “Yeah. And then I keep wondering how Murray could have heard Nikki Parker crying and moaning when he walks past hundreds of graves every day and doesn’t hear those things. And I thought, maybe it’s the pain. Maybe it sticks somehow. Maybe that’s what he’s sensitive to. And I wondered if other whatever-you-call-’ems with that special talent could detect that kind of pain? What, um, circumstances might make it possible? And remember the film we watched a couple of weeks ago? 21 Grams?”

  Movie? Janochek barely paid attention to the films they watched together at home. It was just a chance to sit quietly next to his daughter and enjoy one of the simple pleasures of fatherhood. He tried to regain a purchase on her original question.

  “Wait. Wait! You’re asking whether a clairvoyant person can pick up on someone else’s pain, uh, in the form of an electro-chemical energy trace substance created during a traumatic event? This whatever-it-is might adhere to people’s bodies or to inanimate objects they touch? Could a clairvoyant perceive such residual energy?”

  That rewording was pretty complicated, but as she mulled it over, Pearl thought it might be what she’d meant. “Yeah, uh, maybe. Probably,” she said, encouraged that her father had taken her question seriously.

  Janochek glanced over at his computer as if he needed a reference library for this discussion. “The paranormal … er, clairvoyance is one aspect of paranormal phenomema. Lots of people, absolutely normal people, swear they have seen and/or heard a ghost. I think the main theory about ghosts is that they’ve got some kind of unfinished business and they’re dislocated in time.”

  “Do you believe in ghosts?” Pearl asked, wondering how her dad got interested in the first place.

  “I’ve never seen one,” Janochek said. “Caretaking a cemetery? Could get pretty distracting.”

  Pearl thought about that. Smiled.

  “Anyway,” he went on, “phenomena appearing or speaking is not so unusual, but Murray’s degree of clairvoyant ability is clearly special. There’s some evidence that people with this gift can touch an object owned or loved by a missing person and develop information that contributes to his or her location. I think it’s hit-or-miss. The clairvoyant doesn’t necessarily know what impression is accurate and what’s not.”

  “So Murray might get something if he held the cap?” Pearl was nodding as if she knew she’d been right.

  “Unlikely I think, but who knows? ‘Might’ is probably the operative word.” Janochek sighed. “So, an emotionally charged secretion that leaves a trace? Pretty esoteric, girl. Pretty darn creative. Makes me think you should apply the quality of this thinking to your academic subjects.”

  “Dad, jeez—”

  “Eat your supper, honey, and I’ll try to think of someone I can ask. Sounds like a question for Stephen Hawking, but maybe I’ll start with Siri.”

  “Don’t bother. She said she doesn’t know.” Pearl resumed eating. “Just think about it,” she said. “Acorns become oaks, you know.”

  “Yes, and a grain of sand becomes a pearl or an irritant,” Janochek said, pressing his palm against his forehead. “In this case, salad and turkey become a second baseman. Eat your food.”

  WORKING ON THE RAILROAD

  That afternoon Deputy Gates was stopped at a downtown railroad crossing, waiting for whatever the train crews did during their twenty-minute road blocks. Repaint old boxcars? Lay new track? Finish a hand of pinochle, give the brakeman a pedicure? He decided to wait it out; decided not to set a bad example by turning on his flashers and driving down the sidewalk to get out of the traffic jam. He took the cruiser out of gear and let his mind idle along with the engine. He could see it wasn’t just blocked cars of course. Pedestrians were stacked up waiting to cross.

  Two men in dark suits and flashy ties, lawyers, he bet. Tall brunette in a smart wool suit and high heels? Another lawyer probably. Teenage girl pushing a baby carriage. A knot of boys joking and shoving, popping on and off their skateboards. An older woman carrying a stack of books home from the lib—

  Now he was thinking about the robberies.

  Had he considered a boy on a skateboard? Cover a lot of territory, quick getaway? No. But he hadn’t seen any that he could remember, either. So why? An image slid into place. Each day he’d patrolled he had seen someone. The same someone. And he’d paid her no mind. A young woman pushing a baby carriage. How would a thief transport stolen items without arousing suspicion? Gates hit the flasher to exit the jam. Time for another pass through the Garden Tract.

  * * *

  He pulled to a stop beside the young woman he’d barely noticed on these streets for a few days now. Got out of the car taking his keys and radio.

  “Good morning, officer.”

  “Hello, miss. I have a question.”

  “Sure, just don’t wake my baby.”

  “Do you know that there’s been several home break-ins, thefts in this area the last couple of weeks?

  “Really? No. No idea.”

  “Do you live in this area?”

  “Just visiting my folks. They wanted to meet Justin before I took a new job in the city.”

  “I’d like to meet Justin, too. Don’t wake him. Just pull back the cov—”

  The carriage hit Gates in the leg, barely missing his groin, and the girl was running. Gates, in his late forties, limping now, gave chase. Caught her. Eventually. Because two blocks away she tripped on a curb and knocked herself silly.

  “Will it scar?” she asked. “My chin?” Looking up at him, seeming hardly more than a child.

  At the next morning’s briefing, Gates got a handshake and smiles for what his sergeant called a missed carriage of justice.

  SPIFFED UP

  The newer part of the cemetery faced Continental Street and took up three or four acres. The wrought-iron front gate was right in the middle of this western boundary, so the main entry road went through and up a gradual hill past the lawnmower shed, all the way to Janochek’s workshop and cottage. Another narrow walkw
ay went farther east from there to the top of the ridge and the rear boundary. There, on the edge of the bluff, a tall hedge and fence separated the graveyard from the rodeo grounds below, the convention center, and the river beyond.

  Murray stood at the hedge on the cemetery side of the fence and listened to the voices. They didn’t really make any sense. Weren’t telling him any story, just groaning and mournful. He could understand that. He would be miserable, too, if someone buried him with other people, hidden on a hill, undiscovered, lost, and forgotten.

  Maybe he should look for a broken corner of fence, slip down the hill. Find them. Talk to them. Ask them what they wanted. Maybe. But then what? He couldn’t think what he’d do next that wouldn’t get him in a ton of trouble.

  * * *

  Less than a quarter mile in from the street, another narrow paved walkway ran north and south, separating the newer from the older part where they’d been burying people for over a hundred years.

  Murray’s best friends Dearly and Blessed and Edwin were in the older part, and he still talked to them but not as much. Not since he’d been making new friends with the kids who’d lived during the time he himself had been alive. Kids who might understand what his life was like? Not bloody likely. Oh, your mom’s a prostitute, too. Yeah, I know, small world.

  It was cool that Sandray was the same age, same grade. Pearl was a freshman. Murray rarely encountered her at school and had hardly seen her lately since softball started. Pearl was obnoxious and bullheaded and could be the most annoying person he’d ever met. On the other hand she was strong and bright and funny, and could look so great with her curls and her prankster smile.

  He had to admit, he’d thought about what she’d be like for a girlfriend. He knew she sort of liked him, at least as a friend, but she was a couple of years younger, and Janochek’s daughter. That was a minefield. Murray couldn’t afford to make a mistake there—hurt Pearl’s feelings and wind up getting kicked out of the cemetery. Janochek was almost like a father to him, but he wouldn’t stand for any mess-up that involved Pearl. If Janochek was forced to choose, Murray would be history.

  So if he ever wanted a girlfriend, Pearl wouldn’t do. Too risky. Too difficult. Really, Murray had never given girls this much thought. An actual girlfriend? How would that work? What would they do? He could … bring her to the cemetery? Introduce her to his dead friends? He smiled in spite of himself. Even if he liked somebody, and even if, against all odds, they liked him, it was hopeless. Dead-end street.

  But Sandray … maybe she’d like him pretty well if she got to know him better. She was really attractive and probably really smart.

  * * *

  Walking to her grave, Murray couldn’t believe what he’d just done. You want to feel like a complete idiot? Wash your face and comb your hair before you go talk with a person who’s dead and buried. Not like they know whether you’re spiffed up! Murray didn’t actually see the dead; he imagined what they looked like and he supposed they did the same. With Sandray, he didn’t have to make much up. Reddish-bronze hair, lively eyes, little bit of a curve to her nose that made the end cute as a gumdrop. He remembered her white teeth and great smile. Wow. Guess he’d noticed her more than he’d realized, because he could keep going: tan arms, great legs! Right down to her feet in white runners. He was feeling tingly before he even reached the grave.

  He sat carefully, close to her marker, where he could hold it comfortably. “Were you born in Riverton?”

  “Hey. Maury? Why?”

  “Murray. Just curious. My mom moved up from San Leandro when I was barely two. But I’ve been here since.”

  “I was born in Cheyenne. My dad was the curator of the museum there. Got hired to come to California nine or ten years ago and work for the city doing kind of the same thing.”

  “Wyoming? Lots of cowboys?”

  “I was eight when we moved. I didn’t really notice unless I was out with my family Friday or Saturday nights. Then there’d be pickups and loud radios, guys standing around the sidewalks outside honky-tonks.”

  “Country-western music? We have some of those downtown.”

  “Jimmy’s Rodeo Club. I’ve never been in.”

  “You’re too young, right?”

  “Maybe not. You know Carla? Stacy Hill? They go to your school. They get their look-good on and go about anyplace. I was going to try it.”

  “Wow. What would you do?”

  She laughed. “See if a guy would buy me a drink? I don’t know. Flirt? When I drink a little I really like to dance—”

  The sound went off again. Murray had never experienced a dead person disengaging so immediately, so completely. He thought regular friends who’d been dead for a fairly long time were glad for his company. Maybe their painful feelings weren’t so fresh. Murray wondered if that’s what Sandray’s cutting off was about. Getting real sad, real quick.

  FLEECE AND POWDER

  Bruce couldn’t stop talking, hadn’t been able to sleep the last few nights. Well, he probably could if he wanted to. Other residents were complaining but screw them. He had ideas. Good ideas. He could organize them later, now he needed to say them before he forgot.

  He’d found all these great clothes just a few blocks away at Progressive People Thrift Store. Great clothes! Colors you wouldn’t believe, and cheap! He bought so many shirts they were hard to carry. And fleece up the wazoo. Good for warm or cold. And a rain what-do-you-call-it? Polo? Ponto? Something like that, and some shoes and scarves—he could always use scarves—and another short-brim if he lost the one he was wearing and a Yankee’s cap ’cause everybody liked the Yankees, and a great belt that was a little small but he could put a chain on it and make it longer, and sweaters that he didn’t like but he was going to give them to the old couple that always sat on the couch by the front window. And a couple of pictures for his room, a red car one and something else … a mountain? Yeah. And god he was hungry. And he could use another bag of that new medicine. Slip him back from fifth gear into neutral for a couple of hours.

  The problem with regular medication was that most of it didn’t work. At least not for special people. And he was one of the few people that didn’t like alcohol. Not even that lemonade stuff. He’d been fighting this battle for years and nobody, nobody, understood. Especially not his father. His dad was a nice enough guy, but he wanted Bruce to be like other people. And his doc was nice enough, too, but really, the lady just wanted to dull Bruce out. Take out the creative spikes. In a word, zombify him. Well, hello! The world wasn’t exactly slow. Like today, put these clothes in his room, go to a movie, get a taco at whatever that place was, get a donut, meet some people, and tonight, catch some music? Go for a swim? Hitch to Chico and meet some babes?

  * * *

  Bruce walked in the Sadler House door with his armload of clothes and immediately got in an argument with the Petrushkins on the front couch. They were trying to pretend they didn’t want the sweaters he’d dumped in their laps. That’s another thing Bruce couldn’t stand. Ingrates.

  The manager of the Sadler House where Bruce had his room called Mental Health. The phone call was referred to a psychiatric social worker, Peggy Duheen, who had wound up with Bruce on her caseload when his prior social worker went to work for the Veterans Clinic across town.

  “Duheen.”

  “This is Bobby at the Sadler. You better get down here or get somebody down here before there’s a fight.”

  “Who is it this time?”

  “Guy who’s been calling himself Springsteen but the name is Simmons, Bruce. He’s on a jag. Definitely off the meds. I mean he’s always kind of hypo—”

  “Hyper?”

  “Yeah. Mile a minute. Goofy. Today? Got about twelve layers of clothes on—”

  “Right. I’ll be there as soon as I can. No actual fighting, right?”

  “Not yet.”

  * * *

  Gates finished the written report on the robbery arrest and had just set it in the “Out” tray, w
hen his desk phone rang. Dispatch. Would he take a call from Peggy Duheen, County social worker? Sure.

  Duheen, a sometimes colleague, asked him to help her make a Mental Health client pickup. It was common procedure to get an officer assist on mentally ill patients who might behave unpredictably, possibly dangerously. Duheen and Gates enjoyed each other’s company and worked together whenever possible at Mental Health interdepartmental treatment planning sessions and client community contacts.

  Sheriff’s Department was only a quarter mile from the psych unit. Gates met her in front of the hospital. She hopped in the cruiser and brought him up to speed.

  “We’re going to the Sadler House. Bruce. Robert Barry Compton’s friend from the Parker case?”

  “Wacky kid,” Gates recalled. “Donut fiend. Never seemed very dangerous. Drugs?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “More likely he got to feeling pretty good and thought he didn’t need his meds anymore. Common for bipolar.”

  “He was mostly solid last fall when I was doing things with him and Compton.” Gates smiled. “Where is Mr. Robert Barry Compton, by the way?”

  “Kind of a success story. Got stable on his meds and moved to a halfway house near his mother in Corning. Tehama County is covering him now.”

  Gates smiled, glad to hear it. “So what do you want to do when we get there?”

  “I was hoping you’d talk to him. You know him better. Get him to ride with us to a crisis appointment back at the clinic. Doc’ll see him there.”

  “Copy. I’ll do it if I don’t get pulled by dispatch.”

  They rode in silence till they were stopped by a traffic light on Cypress.

  “You want to do something one of these days?” Gates asked, staring straight ahead.

  Duheen knew she was blushing. She reviewed her recent behavior. Had she been obvious? And what was the right response? Thought you’d never ask? Maybe? Love to? Better not since we’re sort of co-workers?