Felony File

Felony File

Dell Shannon
1980

This one is for
Doreen
Tovey
who likes my books
because I like her books
and
ope to see many more of them
 

In each human heart are a tiger.
a pig, an ass, and a nightingale;
diversity
of character is due to
their unequal
activity.
—Ambrose Bierce

ONE

THE FIRST RAIN of the season had arrived, unexpected
and early, this sixth of November. In the little forest of tall
buildings which was the civic center, lights had come on against the
gray darkness. Midway up the rectangular loom of Parker Center, LAPD
headquarters, the tall windows of the Robbery-Homicide bureau
slithered grayly with the steady downpour; the ranks of fluorescent
lighting were on in the big communal detective office.

At the moment, the office was unoccupied except for
Sergeant Hackett, who was poring over a typed report at his desk. He
glanced up as footsteps sounded in the corridor outside; Mendoza's
voice was noncommittal on some polite amenity, and a heavier voice
rumbled in reply before a door shut. Mendoza wandered into the office
looking dissatisfied. He hadn't been out since the rain began, and
was neat and dapper as always in exquisitely tailored gray
herringbone, immaculate white shirt and dark tie. He hoisted one hip
on the edge of Hackett's desk and said, "That was a waste of
time."

"
On what?" asked Hackett.

Mendoza flicked his lighter. "That chief
security guard at Bullock's, Pierson. A big blank."

"Those other two are down in R. and I. looking
at mug-shots, but do you want to bet they draw a blank too?"

"No bets. That was a very cute operation, Art.
They tell us this and that, we can deduce the M.O., and it takes us
nowhere."

"
We are also nowhere," said Hackett, "on
this new heist job." He laid down the report. Most of the men in
the office had been out getting the first statements on the Bullock's
job. There was never a time, of course, when Robbery-Homicide didn't
have the heist jobs to work, often several at once, and as a rule
they were ephemeral, annoyingly leadless little jobs.

"What about it?" asked Mendoza
uninterestedly.

Hackett took off his glasses. "A pharmacy over
on Second Street, about eleven last night, just as they were closing.
Matt went out on it. I had the two clerks in just now, and took 'em
down to R. and I. No go—none of the mug-shots rang a bell. What
they tell us, it's a female. Very much a female—stacked, golden
blonde, about thirty, good-looking. And all business, with a fairly
big handgun. She got away with about four hundred bucks."

Mendoza laughed. "Well, the libbers are getting
more equal all the time, Art. No reason they shouldn't start pulling
heists."

"She wasn't interested in any drugs, just the
cash register. In and out, and neither of them could say whether she
got away in a car or what."

"
Helpful," agreed Mendoza. But he was
thinking more about the Bullock's job, which so far hadn't offered
any handles either and was a good deal more important.

"
I'll take no bets at all," he repeated,
"that the security men make any shots. Empty gesture. I know, I
know, those two said they got just a glimpse of two of them on the
way out, pulling the masks off, but—"

"
Slick operation all right," said Hackett.
It had been. And one that, so far as anybody remembered, hadn't been
done before.

There were seven floors and a basement of commodities
for sale at Bullock's Department Store at Seventh and Hill. The
personnel, accounting, bookkeeping and purchasing departments were on
the eighth floor. At the end of a business day, the proceeds from the
cash registers of all the various departments were totaled, encased
in canvas bags, and shepherded by security guards up to the
accounting department, whence the bags were eventually conveyed by
the guards to a night drop at the bank. Last night, just after the
store closed, as the bags were on their way up, four armed men had
materialized in the accounting department, immobilized the guards and
the staff remaining in the office, and got clean away with all the
bags. The accounting staff was still trying to arrive at an 
estimate of the loss, and nobody could offer any helpful clues at
all. Two of the security guards had had a very brief look at two of
the heisters, but their descriptions were expectedly vague.

"John was going back to see the chief
accountant. There's no way they can get an exact figure, but an
average day—how the hell many departments in that store, and it's
not the cheapest place in town—might run to three, four hundred
thousand. Some of it would be in checks, but—"

"A very nice haul," said Mendoza, stabbing
out his cigarette rather violently. "Anything in from the lab?"

"
There probably won't be," said Hackett.
"Everybody said they didn't touch anything but the bags and were
wearing gloves anyway."

"
And where is everybody?" asked Mendoza,
looking around the empty office.

"
Tom and Jase are down at R. and I. with the
guards. Henry's out on a new body, and I think Wanda went with him. I
couldn't say about anybody else, I just got back myself."

"
There was another body turned up," said
Sergeant Lake, coming in with a manila envelope. "George and
Conway went out on it. In a house down by the railroad yards. This is
a
billet-doux
from the
D.A."

"
Thank you so much." Mendoza slid out the
contents—a little sheaf of official court documents—on Hackett's
desk and glanced at the accompanying note. "So. The Hoffman
hearing is set for the tenth."

Hackett sighed. "At least the court isn't
dragging its heels. Let's hope, short and sweet." None of them
liked thinking about the Hoffman case much.

They sat in silence for a moment. The rain slithered
steadily down the windows. Mendoza lighted another cigarette.
Footsteps sounded in the corridor and Higgins and Conway came in.
They looked wet and disgruntled. "So who's going to do the
report?" asked Higgins. Conway fished out a quarter and tossed
it.

"
Heads."

"
Oh, hell," said Conway, uncovering the
quarter.

"
What was the body?" asked Hackett.

"
Nothing much." Higgins sat down at his
desk and got out a cigarette. "Probably an O.D., dumped in an
empty house. God knows how long it's been there—couple of weeks at
least. The owner found it, and the last time he was there was about
that long ago. Male Caucasian about twenty-five. See if his prints
are on file." Conway had rolled the triplicate forms into his
typewriter and was starting the initial report. "Anything show
up on the Bullock's job?"

"
I can prophesy right now, it's a dead end,"
said Mendoza. "Damnation, these smart pros—" That
particular M.O. didn't show in any of their files; there was no
handle on that at all.

"
I see you made a start on painting the
kitchen," said Hackett to Higgins.

"
What? Yeah, I got the first coat on," said
Higgins.

"
You missed a spot just behind your right ear,"
said Hackett, and Higgins swore and felt for it.

"
The place needs painting outside too but it'll
have to wait till spring. Damned if I'll take on that job. It's been
enough of an upheaval to move."

Hackett picked up his report again. For a couple of
minutes the only sound was the staccato tapping of Conway's
typewriter, and then Sergeant Lake looked in again.

"
You've got a new one down," he said
succinctly.

"
Robbery and homicide. Portia Street."

"
Oh, for God's sake," said Higgins.

"
I'm busy," said Hackett hastily, getting
up. "I'm going down to ask records if we have any beautiful
blonde heisters on file. Besides, you've been sitting in a nice dry
office all day, you're due for some legwork."

"
Hell," said Mendoza mildly.

"
And I don't suppose I can get any wetter,"
said Higgins gloomily. They went out reluctantly.

The rain had been completely unforeseen by the
weather bureau, and as up to yesterday the temperature had hovered
around seventy, nobody had worn a coat this morning. At the front
entrance of the building, Mendoza and Higgins stood at the top of the
steps for a moment; the rain was pouring down monotonously, and the
concrete jungle all around Parker Center looked very wet and
uninviting. It was a good fifty yards to the parking lot.

"
Damn it, this is a new suit," said
Mendoza. Resignedly, they turned their collars up and pulled hatbrims
down and launched into the rain. By the time they reached Mendoza's
Ferrari they were both dripping.

"
Portia Street," said Higgins. "That's
up toward Silver Lake." Up to a few years ago, one of the quiet
back-waters of town; but recently the crime rate was climbing in that
area, which was why the Higginses had sold the house on Silver Lake
Boulevard. Mendoza started the engine and backed out of the slot.

It wasn't far enough off to justify the freeway; he
went up Sunset, where it curved narrowly here at its beginning;
Portia Street crossed it a little way up from Elysian Park Avenue. It
was a tired old residential street, modest single houses lining it on
each side, mostly frame places dating from the twenties. The houses
were neatly enough maintained, with strips of lawn in front. The
black-and-white squad was in front of a house midway down the block,
a square pseudo-Spanish crackerbox house painted dingy yellow. In the
deluge of rain, there weren't any neighbors out staring, but there
was a woman standing with the uniformed figure of Patrolman Zimmerman
on the little square front porch.

When Mendoza and Higgins joined them the porch was
crowded, but neither Zimmerman nor the woman made a move toward the
open front door past a sagging screen door. "This is Mrs.
Meeker," said Zimmerman, "from next door. These are the
detectives from head-quarters, ma'am—Lieutenant Mendoza, Sergeant
Higgins."

"
It's just terrible," she said. "Just
terrible." She was a nice-looking middle-aged woman, a little
too plump, with dark hair; she was wearing a cotton housedress with
an old gray cardigan over it, and she was hugging herself, shivering,
not altogether because of the cold rain. "I've always tried to
be neighborly—we've lived here nearly twenty-five years and the
Whalens lived here more like thirty-five, this was their folks'
house. They always seemed to get along fine, but it must have been
hard for Dave, not that he ever complained, he was such a nice man,
so good and gentle and patient—and the Lord knows there wouldn't
have been much there worth anything, I know he never kept cash
around—and it's bad enough they should break in and rob them, but
why they had to—oh, Lord, poor Dave dead there on the floor—"
She began to cry a little.

"Never did any harm to anybody, and what Dan's
going to do without him—and broad daylight, too—it's
terrible—Harry and I've been talking about getting out of the city,
the crime rate up so high, but this happening right next door, it
brings it home. Everybody liked Dave so much, you had to admire them,
how they got along—"

"They came in the back," said Zimmerman,
"by what I got from Mr. Daniel Whalen. I don't suppose there'll
be anything for the lab."

"You never know. There'll be a mobile unit out,"
said Higgins. Mrs. Meeker was still talking as he and Mendoza went
in.

The front door led directly into a long narrow living
room. It contained a good deal of old-fashioned furniture: a big
couch, two matching chairs, and a TV on a wheeled stand at one end
where a small false hearth was built in on one wall; at the other end
were a round oak dining table and chairs, and a heavy old sideboard.
In the middle of the room sat a man in a wheelchair.

He looked to be about sixty; he had thin gray hair
and a long thin face, and his body was thin too and fraillooking. He
was neatly enough dressed in gray slacks, open-necked shirt and a
blue sweater. He looked up at them as they came in, and said in an
expressionless tone, "He's in the kitchen. Dave. I don't know
why they killed him. They didn't have to kill him, just for twelve
dollars."