The Truth Can Get You Killed Read online

  As they walked through Area Ten Headquarters, they maneuvered around numerous homeless people allowed to huddle in various corners of the station overnight for warmth. The mass of people added to the smell and confusion of the overflow crowd of drunks and out-of-control party-goers whom Chicago’s cops had deemed unworthy or unable to find their own way home last night.

  They signed out a car and Fenwick drove through the nearly deserted streets with his usual kamikaze flair. Patches of ice and fifteen-below-zero temperatures wouldn’t put a dent in Fenwick’s urge to careen madly through the streets. Today Fenwick included banging on the controls of the car’s heating unit to his driving drill. It took several minutes for the thin trickle of heat to ooze from the car vents. At first, Buck fiddled with the controls at every stop, then he’d started banging with the flat of his hand.

  Before Fenwick could totally destroy the dashboard, Turner took a stab at coaxing enough puffs of heat from the engine to keep the cold at bay. His calm manipulations did little more than Fenwick’s bashing.

  Area Ten ran from Fullerton Avenue on the north to Lake Michigan on the east, south to Fifty-ninth Street, and west to Halsted. It included the wealth of downtown Chicago and North Michigan Avenue, some of the nastiest slums in the city, along with numerous upscale developments. It incorporated four police districts. The cops in the Areas in Chicago handled homicides and any major nonlethal violent crimes. The Districts mostly took care of neighborhood patrols and initial responses to incidents. Turner had long since stopped correcting visitors who called where he worked a police precinct. One quick way to tell a crime victim/tourist from New York, or an incredibly stupid copyeditor, was their insistence on going to the precinct to report a crime.

  Halfway to the murder scene, Paul mentioned his discussion last night with Ben. He finished, “I don’t know who he got hold of at Area Ten.”

  “More than enough assholes in the place to pull that kind of stunt. I could snoop around.”

  “Let me think about that.”

  “Want me to have Madge talk to Ben?”

  “It might help, but I’m not sure. A big part of the problem is that somebody blew him off because they assumed he was my lover. I doubt if Madge can fix that.”

  “Maybe just to reassure him. Madge has a way about her.”

  “The goofy thing is, how did the person who took the call know it wasn’t just a friend or maybe a brother or even my dad?”

  “Good question. Although even assholes can jump to conclusions.”

  These days Paul did not hide his sexuality from those with whom he worked closely. He figured part of the reason he hadn’t had major problems with prejudice was that he’d worked in Area Ten for more than eleven years before his orientation became generally known. Since his wife’s death, his natural reticence to talk about his private life left their speculations free to roam. Also, with lack of evidence to the contrary, people usually assumed you were straight.

  Radical gay people might call this selling out, but it was a way a lot of gay people were out on the job. In the still predominantly straight male world of most, if not all, police departments, being an openly gay recruit left you vulnerable to harassment from your peers. Prejudice might be against the law, recruitment of gay officers a desired goal, but in the real world lots of young, straight, male cop wannabees could be vicious.

  They pulled into the alley off Lincoln Avenue a block and a half south of Fullerton. They parked behind a blue-and-white squad car.

  A clump of five people huddled under the eaves of a garage ten feet away. A few glanced in their direction. All of them, including Turner and Fenwick, wore heavy shoes, shirts, pants, socks, and coats. In the fifteen-below-zero temperatures, hats covered heads to well below the ears and scarves enwrapped mouths and faces. The fierce north wind dispersed the clouds of vapor formed by their breaths. Turner saw icicles building on the outside of the scarves where the steam escaped nearest the mouth.

  “What have we got?” Turner asked.

  A figure pointed ten feet away to a dark green garbage container. “Dead body in that dumpster. Bullet hole in the middle of his forehead. Trail of blood leads off in that direction.” He aimed a glove at the far side of the dumpster. “Followed it, but it ends in the middle of the alley. Don’t know if it’ll help.”

  Turner didn’t recognize any of the well-muffled faces, but he thought this voice was that of David McWilliams, a patrolman they’d worked with before.

  “Who found the body?” Turner asked.

  “I did,” said the smallest of the muffled figures.

  “You live around here?”

  The person pointed to a house on the other side of the alley.

  Turner said to McWilliams, “Why don’t you take him in to where it’s warm, and we’ll check in with you later?”

  McWilliams agreed with alacrity.

  When the civilian was gone Fenwick asked, “This one in the pool?”

  The detectives at Area Ten had placed bets on the time of the finding of the first dead body of the year in the part of the city they patrolled. They’d given up using the instant of death as the basis for their wagers, since that science was too inexact—the time the first call came in to the dispatcher was the key. Also the dead person had to have been murdered.

  “Call came in at seven forty-seven.”

  “Got to be somebody earlier,” Fenwick said. “I’ve got fifty bucks on two twenty-six.”

  The two detectives assigned a couple of the beat cops to begin the canvass of the neighborhood. Another one was told to keep spectators away from the crime scene. This poor cop could keep warm in the patrol car, but would need to make forays into the alley if any brave but frozen local denizens appeared.

  Turner gazed around the alley. It was completely deserted. Along the east side was a block of houses. On the west were the backs of businesses that fronted on Lincoln Avenue. He wasn’t sure which business was which, but one of those nearby had to be the back door of Au Naturel. All the businesses and most of the homes abutted directly on each other. A few of the homes had a few feet between them. Most were unprepossessing, but Turner knew the average price of a home in this neighborhood was around $300,000. Lincoln Park was one of the most desirable areas in the city in which to live. Used-home buyers in this area often paid the high price, left the walls up for tax purposes, gutted the insides, and redid the whole interior, giving them a renovated home with an asking price of over $500,000.

  The alley had been cleared of snow, as had most of the streets. A few inches of wind-driven ice crystals had fallen last week before the deep freeze hit. The scattered patches of snow were trodden well beyond the point of possibly holding any useful footprints. The frozen puddles of sparkling ice would be useless in providing any kind of clues.

  Turner and Fenwick did not rush to see the body. They clutched pencils awkwardly in gloved hands as they made quick sketches of all they could see. Despite being well bundled against the cold, the wind seemed to seep between the threads of their clothing and brush their skin with icy trickles. Turner and Fenwick retired to the feeble warmth of the car to make more elaborate drawings and fill in what they’d started out in the cold. They left the car only when the Crime Lab truck pulled up behind their vehicle.

  Fenwick, Turner, and two of the technicians slowly approached the dumpster. Five feet from the garbage coffin, they all stopped. An obvious trail of blood led from the side of the dumpster and then north down the alley.

  After photos had been taken, Fenwick and Turner finally made a careful examination of the contents of the overgrown trash can. As they had been told, a body lay there with a bullet hole in the middle of the forehead. The hole was massive, attesting to a large-caliber fire arm. The detritus in the dumpster filled it about halfway. Every bit of garbage would have to be preserved. At least in its frozen state it wouldn’t be as odiferous or offensive as it would be were it high summer in Chicago.

  Fenwick touched the body. Frozen so stif
f it might as well have been chipped from marble.

  The investigation was slowed by the fact that every ten minutes, they retired to the Crime Lab van to get warm. As Fenwick put it, “I’m in no hurry to freeze to death, and the dead body isn’t going to care.”

  The dead person was a white male who looked to be anywhere from his midfifties to midsixties. Weight probably around two hundred. Probably at least five-eight, although it was difficult to tell because the body was slightly twisted and scrunched up. Bald with a fringe of gray hair, large mole on the right ear, and clean shaven. He was wearing a navy blue overcoat over an Armani three-piece suit, and Gucci shoes.

  They followed the trail of blood but, as they’d been told, it ended about ten feet down the alley. There was no indication where it might have gone from there or why it stopped. They’d have uniformed cops check the backyards and fronts of every building in this and the surrounding blocks.

  After a thorough preliminary examination, Fenwick managed to free a billfold from the inside pocket of the man’s overcoat. In the van, he and Turner examined the contents.

  “Judge Albert Meade,” Turner read.

  “A judgesicle,” Fenwick opined.

  The name meant nothing to either of them. They knew many of the judges from the local criminal courts and this was not one of them. They found cards and identification for VISA and Mastercard, the Chicago Public Library, ATM, social security, voters registration, health and car insurance, along with sixty-one dollars. In the other pockets they had found car keys, three quarters, a dime, and a handkerchief.

  In the van, Turner and Fenwick, the medical examiner, and the Crime Lab technicians gathered to discuss their findings.

  “Definitely not robbery,” Fenwick said.

  Nods of agreement.

  “He killed here?” Turner asked.

  “Unlikely. Couple considerations. That wound would have bled a lot and there are no remnants of the bullet’s exit. Blood trail stops so abruptly. Not sure it really says much about where the killer came from, but it says to me the dead guy was probably driven here. Of course, the killer could have been walking for any distance, body shifts, or moves, blood starts to drip. Or killer accidentally gets blood on his heel, any number of possibilities.”

  “Could the blood be the killer’s and not the victim’s?”

  “Possible. After we’ve had it tested, we’ll be able to tell.”

  “Could he have carried him from one of the houses nearby?”

  “Sure, but why risk being seen?”

  Fenwick said, “Duh, because where he shot him would have told us who the killer is?”

  “Fenwick, how many killers has your sarcasm caught?” The question came from one of the old timers in the Medical Examiner’s office.

  “Two just last week,” Fenwick retorted.

  “Can we get on with it?” one of the Crime Lab people asked. “I want to see the kick-off of the Cotton Bowl.”

  “I don’t think it was much of a risk either way,” Turner said. “Driving up with or dragging around a body. No alley in Chicago is going to have herds of people thundering down it at night. Cold as it was this morning, the killer could have thrown himself a party out here and not be noticed.”

  “Already started the canvass of the neighborhood.”

  “So, we’re mostly agreed. Not killed here and was driven or carried to this spot.”

  “If the killer’s going to put him in the dumpster, why stop the car ten feet away?”

  “Maybe he didn’t drive up.”

  “Or why not leave him in a dumpster closer to where the blood trail starts?”

  “This is about halfway down the alley. Farthest from either street.”

  “Why not just leave him in the alley instead of toting him all the way to the dumpster and heaving him in?”

  Universal shrugs.

  “Then we’ve got a big criminal.”

  “Or at least a strong one.”

  “Dead guy’s clothes are drenched with blood. Killer must have gotten it all over.”

  “With half his brain missing, we can rule out suicide.”

  Fenwick said, “Your perception of the obvious is remarkable.”

  “Somebody chain him outside in the cold.”

  Turner said, “Must have been killed somewhere else and brought here. Love to find out where.”

  Moving a victim from a crime scene was always a smart idea on the part of a criminal. Invariably, it made it tougher for the cops to solve a case. If you were going to get clues, the original crime scene would normally have the best ones. Some detectives swore that a killer always left their signature somewhere at the sight of the death.

  One of the beat cops joined them. “Got the stuff you wanted on the guy. He was a federal judge in the Seventh Circuit, which includes all of Illinois and a couple surrounding states. He’s been on the bench twenty-three years and was a lawyer in town before then. He’s got a wife and two kids. Lived in Chicago.”

  “Let’s talk to our helpful citizen/body finder,” Fenwick said. “No offense to you guys, but I want to get my ass into someplace totally warm.”

  3

  Turner and Fenwick walked across the alley. They slowed their pace as they entered the yard. Each observed the path to the door and the surrounding area carefully. No sign of blood or of a body having been dragged or carried.

  “You know what I hate most about winter?” Fenwick asked as they knocked on the back door of a Queen Anne-style house.

  “Snow and cold?”

  “That too.” Fenwick pulled at the crotch of his pants, “No, my long winter underwear gives me jock itch.”

  “Thanks for sharing.”

  A now recognizable Dave McWilliams opened the back door of the house.

  “He’s in the kitchen,” McWilliams told them.

  Turner stopped for a minute and let the warmth of the home ease into his psyche. Jumping in and out of the cold had been miserable. He accepted a cup of coffee gratefully and let his hands surround the ceramic mug. He left his jacket on for the moment.

  He glanced around the kitchen. The floors gleamed. The walls were done in very pale beige and the cabinets in a very muted, very light brown. A cuisinart in one corner. A microwave oven in another. Electric stove. Large refrigerator. Butcher-block table.

  The beat cop donned his winter gear and left.

  Calvin Hancock, whose home they were in, sat opposite Turner and Fenwick at the table. They thanked him for making the call and being helpful.

  “Tell us how you happened to find the body,” Fenwick said.

  “I told the others already.”

  Hancock was around five-foot-two with spindly arms and a narrow pinched face. Turner didn’t picture him toting around a two-hundred-pound corpse.

  Neither loudly nor angrily, Fenwick said, “I don’t like working on holidays when everybody else has off. I was going to miss three football games already today. Now, I’m going to miss at least seven because of this murder. I am not a very friendly person in general, so why don’t you just tell us what happened without the crap, and we can all go home sooner?”

  Hancock’s eyes widened at Fenwick whose massive bulk took up a great deal of space in the reasonably large kitchen.

  “I am home,” Hancock said.

  “Why don’t you start at the beginning?” Fenwick suggested.

  “Surely.”

  “Don’t call me Shirley,” Fenwick said.

  Hancock looked as if he didn’t know whether he should laugh at Fenwick’s feeble humor or not.

  Turner ignored Fenwick’s crack. “Go ahead, Mr. Hancock.”

  The man gave a nineteenth-century upper-class British sniff. “Well, around seven this morning I took out the garbage from my party last night. Three of my friends and I have been getting together for dinner at one another’s homes on New Year’s Eve for twenty years. We don’t like to be out on the streets or in crowded bars or at loud, uncivilized parties. One of us always cooks for t
he others. In the library, over coffee and dessert, we listened to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. We always play that on New Year’s. It’s a memory of when we all went to college. We were so poor—it was the only album in the apartment, the first time we did this. I cleaned last night, but waited until I was going out for the papers today to take out the garbage. This way I could combine the two trips. I didn’t want to have to don all my winter accoutrements twice if I didn’t have to.”

  “What happened in the alley?” Turner asked.

  “My dumpster is across the way from the one with the body. I put my debris in my own and began to walk away. I noticed the red spots on the ground. At first I thought they were some kind of champagne or a sauce of some kind. The trail led to the dumpster opposite. The lid was open. I don’t like that in our alley. Those businesses across the way don’t watch for that as much as they should. Even in this weather leaving them open like that will attract vermin. I went over to close it. I reached for the lid and barely glanced in. As you know, the body was right there. I immediately returned here and phoned the police. I hope they still have some newspapers left when I’m finally allowed to go to the store.”

  “We’re almost done, Mr. Hancock,” Turner said.

  “You know the dead guy?” Fenwick asked.

  “Not from what I saw. I didn’t look at the face that much. Who was it?”

  “Albert Meade?”

  “The judge?”

  “You do know him?”

  “I know of him. Every gay person who keeps up with the news should know who he is.”

  “Who is he?” Fenwick asked.

  “Albert Meade is one of the three judges who ruled, the day before Christmas, that the antigay law in Du Page County was legal.”