Dead Birmingham

by Timothy C. Phillips

  Broom rose. “Maybe so. It all boils down to cash, more than likely. Money isn’t the only reason that people kill each other, but it sure is one of their favorites. Whatever the case, I intend to find out. We’ll find out what the big deal is about this antique jewelry case. I don’t want anyone else to get hurt over it, one way or the other. I want the guy who killed that kid. So it looks like I need to talk to your client, this mysterious little old man of yours. No one’s accusing him of anything yet. Come along if you like. I promise to be nice.”

  “You got it.”

  Chapter 14

  Excerpt from Scott Anthony LaRue’s unpublished manuscript, Shoplifting in the 21st Century: Boosting for Fun and Profit:

  The small store, however, is not for the beginner. The Mom and Pop variety holds many surprises. The unwary may find themselves looking down a gun barrel or facing other dire consequences if they are caught boosting an item by the private owner. Such perils are unknown in the malls and soulless department stores that cover America like a corporate scourge. The beginner should still, of course, be careful. Overconfidence can be fatal. The very small store, or the specialty shop, is the province of the professional Booster, and is never for the grab and run newbie.

  * * *

  Malvagio wasn’t in. His nephew, Umberto, was, but he didn’t know anything. “I never heard about any box from Uncle Fausto, honest.”

  “Where is Uncle Fausto right now?” Broom pulled himself to his full towering height. The kid looked uneasy. McMahon fiddled with something on the counter, pretended disinterest. I stood impassively behind Broom.

  “Uncle Fausto, he had to go out of town. I think he went to an auction, something like that. Anyway, I mind the store for him, sometimes. It’s no big deal.”

  “No big deal,” Broom repeated.

  The kid looked up apprehensively at the giant detective.

  “When is Uncle Fausto expected back?”

  “T–tomorrow afternoon.”

  “I don’t suppose you have any way to get in touch with him? Like in case his shop gets burglarized? Or burns down? Cell phone, maybe?”

  “No. No, I swear. My dad called me and told me to come mind the shop. I have no idea where my uncle is.”

  Broom whipped out a card and put it in the kid’s shirt pocket. “Now listen, son. Just as soon as your uncle gets in, you give him this. You tell him to call me, because he and I have a lot to talk about. You got that?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “That went well,” I said as we walked out of the little shop.

  “I don’t like this one bit,” Broom growled. “We got a dead kid and now it looks like this guy is ducking us.”

  “Maybe he’s out looking for this thing himself,” I ventured.

  “Maybe. One thing’s for sure, somebody needs to find these kids before this thing goes any farther. Come on. Let’s go see if we can find this old guy. I got questions, and something tells me he’s got the answers.”

  Chapter 15

  The Foreigner had been to America before, but never to the South. He liked the lush greenery and the more laid-back pace of things. It reminded of the aspen woodlands of Germany, though it was much warmer. Ah, Germany, his homeland. East Germany, to be more precise; the old German Democratic Republic, Soviet Satellite. He remembered how he had come into the business he was in. He and some other young thieves had been rounded up by the Polizei during a routine sweep. They had been thrown into a cold, cinder block prison. He had languished unfed in a bare cell for two days. Guards had come very early one morning, and dragged him from his cell and sat him in front of a political officer.

  The man was a veteran of the Eastern War. His face was scarred and his smile was colder by far than the cinder block cell. He had thrown a file down on the table between them and said, “You are a very accomplished thief. Quite stealthy, and rather an expert at breaking into structures, according to your file. A natural. Let us make a little deal. If you would like to not have to fear the Polizei, ever again, you will do as I instruct.”

  He had sat, wide-eyed, until he realized the man was awaiting a reaction. He had shivered and nodded vigorously. The man had nodded and the polizei behind him had withdrawn. The scarred political officer had instructed his scared young “volunteer” to kill another political officer. Kill him and any witnesses. The quality of his performance was very important. He was to leave certain evidence at the scene that would implicate another political rival.

  He had never killed anyone before that day, but he had lived a brutal life, first in the cold impersonal government-run orphanages, and later on the streets of Dresden. And he was to perform the deed with whatever weapons were at hand.

  He had gone about it very methodically. Getting into the house was easy enough. It was situated at the end of a wooded drive, and as he discovered in his stealthy prowl of the grounds, the back door had been left unlatched. This was a quiet countryside lane, and there were no neighbors within earshot. On the back stoop there was wood, stacked and split, and there he had found what he would use for the deed, a hatchet.

  He had found the three children in the back room. He had never done anything like it before, nothing remotely like it, but when he had finished with them he looked up to see their mother. He would always remember her there, framed in the doorway like a Madonna in an alcove on a cathedral wall, her mouth a perfect circle of horror, because he had really overdone it on the kids he supposed.

  “Es tut mir leid, Mutter,” he told her, and knocked her down with the back of the hatchet and he had felt so sorry for her.

  “Toten Sie mich schnell,” she had said in a dazed whisper; kill me quickly.

  But no. Unfortunately for her, she had been a lovely woman and so he had taken his time.

  It was a long time before her husband came home. A very long time. When at last he was done with them, he had left a Communist Party pin and some other items he had been given to be found by investigators. These were to implicate a certain adversary of the scarred political officer.

  The Foreigner sat quietly, recalling the events that followed his initial assignment: The adversary was denounced and arrested, per the plan; the scarred political officer had been very impressed, so things had gotten easier after that.

  From there the political officer assigned him to a special political unit in the military, where he had been ruthlessly trained, his native skills honed. There would be no more messy carnage as in Dresden. He learned to murder by numbers, kill as instructed.

  Then had come the end of the Cold War. German reunification. Old contacts had disappeared. Old rivalries had suddenly dried up. It was suddenly a new age. But there were still people who needed to die, it seemed. Now he killed for money, because he had to stay moving, both to find employers and to escape detection. Fortunately, his rarified skills demanded a high price. So that is what he did. He killed and moved, killed and moved. Always killing, always moving. It was all he knew, and he liked it, loved it, in fact; he was an artist and there was no other like him.

  He knew the way of thieves, because he had, after all, begun as a street urchin. Where there were small, valuable items, easy to steal, he knew he would find these children, his prey. He had found the perfect target. An electronics store was having a weekend sale. Items were actually placed outside the doors in large clearance bins. Very trusting. Also, very easy prey for young thieves, with quick hands and faster feet.

  He waited in a rental car for several hours, watching the store closely. He knew it was them the instant he saw them. Killer’s intuition. There were only two of them, however. There should have been five, still. But that mattered little. They would steal and flee to their den, and there he would find the rest of them. And the object that he was to recover would be there. Then he would kill them, and be on his way again.

  He inspected the pair carefully. A tall young black man and an Asian girl. Attractive young people. Particularly the girl. Her hair boasted a pink streak; her face was pierced i
n several places. She was quite beautiful. The young man wore a shirt open to his navel, and a chain of some kind around his neck. The girl, he noted, carried a gaudy, oversize handbag. Now that was a tad obvious, he thought.

  They were brazen. He watched as the young man selected items with a discerning eye, and the girl opened her bag for him. They were obviously lovers, the way they worked together, so close to each other. He wondered what it would be like to have such a wild, beautiful young girl beside you. He picked up a satchel that lay on the seat.

  Beautiful, yes. But soon she would be dead.

  He saw them exchange words and start to walk away from the bins. They were smiling at each other. Lovers they must be. Slowly, The Foreigner opened the door of the car.

  Chapter 16

  “One more, Yim.”

  “Make it quick, we’re getting hot.”

  These people had to be crazy, Bone decided. Bins full of computer software and electronic gadgets outside with no one to watch them? Not even a camera?

  “Okay, let’s roll.”

  They turned and casually started walking toward the corner of the building.

  “When we get to the corner, take off, you know where to meet me.”

  “See you there, sexy.”

  Bone shot a glance behind them, and did a double-take.

  “Now what the . . . ?” There was a man, nonchalantly strolling along behind them. He was extremely pale, and dressed in an expensive black suit. Looked like Bela Lugosi, Bone thought. He had an air about him that was disturbing, even at a distance, and he was carrying something.

  “Shit. I think we got a store cop on us. Some white cat in a black suit. Motherfucker looks like a vampire,” he said in a rapid whisper.

  “Great. Now what?” They had come to the corner.

  “Stick to what we always do. I’ll see you in a while. Go to the meeting place we talked about. I’ll lose this fucker. You got the goods. Take off.” They had planned the getaway. Yim would cut through the overgrown lot behind the store and make her way to a pre-arranged meeting place before heading to the fence’s place. Meanwhile, Bone would remain obvious and draw off any pursuers. After all, he had nothing on him, if the cops stopped him.

  Yim broke into a run at the edge of the building, and Bone turned to confront the man.

  He wasn’t there.

  “What the? Where you at, Dracula?” Bone said aloud. But no time to waste. He started walking toward a large mall that sat at the intersection. Once he was off the property, a store detective couldn’t do jack shit. If that’s what that guy was. He had picked up a weird vibe off that dude. Something in the man’s eyes. Screw it now, though, he was almost off the property.

  Bone came to the edge of the lot, vaulted a concrete barrier, and dodged down a alley that ran between a warehouse and a closed store with a “For Sale or Lease” sign in the front window. Yim and he had made out well, he knew. Had to be a solid grand in that bag. They had been doing quite a bit of shopping, today. He came to a vacant lot behind the two buildings. He looked around, and climbed up onto the loading bay at the rear of the store.

  No way that guy followed me, Bone told himself. But he couldn’t shake the feeling the man had given him.

  Man you got the nervous shakes? he asked himself. Mission accomplished. Let it drop. In about an hour go to the spot and meet Yim. My little cherry blossom.

  Then lightning went off in his skull, and the world turned red.

  Jesus—

  Bone spun and tried to stand, but his legs refused to work correctly. A face swam into view, and he knew he was blacking out. As he sank to the ground he realized it was the man—the guy who looked like Bela Lugosi.

  Flat on his back on the cement, Bone looked up at the man who stood over him. Andthen he realized what it was about the pale apparition that bothered him so much. It was his eyes. They were like a shark’s, black and empty—as black as the darkness into which he was falling.

  * * *

  Bone was coming out of it. What had happened? Yim. Yim and he . . . had they gotten caught? No. wait. They had gotten away. His head hurt. Something stank. Smelled like a hospital. Somebody was waking him up, sticking something under his nose.

  Oh my God! It was him! Count Dracula. Terror flood bone’s body. Who are you? He wanted to scream, but he realized that his mouth was stuffed with something, one of his own socks, some still calm voice in his mind noted.

  This was all wrong. He realized now that this man wasn’t a store detective, wasn’t anything he had previously encountered. This man was Death.

  The man had donned a plastic raincoat, Bone noted with growing horror. On the table behind him was an assortment of knives, a saw, other horrible things.

  Man you got to be shitting me. Bone gnawed at the sweaty sock that filled his mouth, trying to speak. This wasn’t for real, couldn’t be. They were just trying to scare the shit out of him, and it was working.

  The man began to speak. “I am in the employ of a certain gentleman,” he announced quietly, almost shyly, it seemed to Bone, as though he spoke very seldom. He had some kind of accent, Russian? German? His English was precise and refined. “This gentleman has had something stolen from him. A tawdry business. This was an important item, the safekeeping of which he had entrusted to someone. This person allowed it to be taken from him.”

  There was a small shake of the man’s head. People are so careless these days, that small gesture seemed to say. Tsk, tsk.

  “I have been sent, by the owner, to deal with all concerned. Now, here is the crux of the matter. We believe that his property was stolen by you, or by one of your young friends.” He moved over to the table and picked up a long, narrow-bladed knife. “What my employer has asked me to do is to recover this item. But this gentleman was embarrassed, as you well can imagine. His reputation was damaged by this theft. So, in addition to recovering the item, a lesson is to be administered to all parties, as well. This is to insure that my employer recovers his esteem, as well as his property.”

  What item? What item? But the words were muffled, his mouth full of gnawed cloth.

  “Not yet. You will be allowed to speak momentarily. If you tell me where I might find the item, we can be done here rather quickly. If you resist, however, these proceedings might require quite some time.”

  He put the point of the knife up to Bone’s chest. It looked very sharp. “Now, my young friend. Let us get to know each other a little better.”

  Chapter 17

  We were still sitting there, Broom and Mack and me, mulling over the similarities in their cases, when the call came in.

  Cassandra Taylor, A red-haired female officer came in from the front office while we were working on our second pot of black coffee. A uniformed sergeant, Cassandra Taylor was a still youngish woman with serious, bright green eyes that had seen a lot.

  “Good morning, Sarge,” Broom offered with a weary smile.

  “It’s not morning any more, and it’s not so good, either.” She frowned. “We have another dead kid. Over on the North Side.”

  * * *

  The North Side of Birmingham had once been home for the workers for its steel mills. Once called the Bethlehem of the South, she was a steel town in those days, a Nineteenth Century boom town. Housing had grown up all over the north side in those days, most of it shoddy, because people crowded in to work there, and the people lived in the shadow of the iron works that spewed the black cloud of progress over the city, and into the virgin sky, and they lived and labored and died and were buried there by the tens of thousands.

  But when things improved for part of the city, they got worse for other parts. Birmingham was no longer the Bethlehem of the South. Now she was a major banking hub for the entire Southeastern United States. Downtown crime had faded to nothing, but out on the dirty fringes, murder, robbery, and the rackets flourished.

  Now the former great iron works were silent rusting relics, and the original housing had long ago slid into ruin. Other h
ousing had risen to replace it, housing projects for the hopeless, rank upon rank of unceremonious brown prison blocks, hundreds of units apiece; and new factories that turned out the disenchanted, the disenfranchised, and the desperate in assembly lines that raced out of control, faster and more productive every year.

  Crime swelled the sickness of the North Side. The victim and the perpetrator each took their turn in a macabre dance that started every evening and went until dawn, and it mattered not if a dancer or two fell nightly, since there were always others eagerly awaiting their chances in the wings.

  Casualties weren’t any big surprise. Gangs had split the area into turfs, long ago. Crime families of a higher order had imposed districts of their own, as well. Clashes were not rare, and violence of some variety was a nightly occurrence. But that was different; that was business, at least on some lost and primeval level.

  This killing, with its torture and mutilation, was simply evil, at least according to the likes of Detective Lieutenant Lester Broom.

  The kid was lying in the vacant lot behind a long-closed grocery store. The sign on the store said Save-a-Million. The letters were faded to the color of a three-day-old tomato peel. Nothing had been saved there in a long, long time. Newspapers and other trash flipped and fluttered in the breeze as they walked across the vast, empty parking lot to the vacant lot in the rear. He was lying in the shrubs, and he was hard to look at.

  “Fredrick ‘Bone’ Mullally,” Mack was reading. “Age twenty-three. Prior convictions include shoplifting and passing a worthless instrument. Dropped out of the University of West Georgia two years ago. Parents last heard from him just over a month ago. At that time, he stated that he was staying with friends. Parents also stated that he was dating a Korean girl, name of Yim, that he wanted his parents to meet.”