Another random thought oddity I'm afraid, just the start of a short story based on ideas I had previously (comes of not sleeping well the last few days due to workmen next door). The setting is 1950's California.
One
Death can be indifferent but a murder, well, that’s always personal.
The trick is to avoid being an eye-witness, but it was going to be hard pulling off the ‘innocent bystander’ routine with a blood-splattered corpse on my office carpet. I’d stayed late at the office, the alternatives being a dull evening alone in my flea-pit apartment or getting hammered in Rosie’s Bar, again. So I’d scored some Chinese and just kicked-back; jacket off, feet up, forking in noodles and getting sauce stains down my shirtfront. No big deal as I’d worn it for the last two days and it needed changing anyway. I was contemplating something stronger to drink than the can of soda when a shadow fell across the blotter and I looked up – right into the face of my past.
There was a teenager standing in the doorway, just a kid, really, in jeans and plaid shirt hanging loose. Before he could speak some joker in the darkened outer office shot him, bam, just like that. A small calibre weapon, and silenced; in through the back of the skull and out through the left eye, leaving me with blood and brains in my food and a body on the floor.
I hit the deck, noodles in the air, seeking cover behind the empty water cooler. For the umpteenth time I cursed the fact they wouldn’t let me carry a gun and wondered if I could risk scuttling over to get the buckshee luger that my partner Jimmy keeps taped beneath his desk. The Imp dived off a filing cabinet into the over-flowing waste basket and burrowed in, but I didn’t have to worry about him as I know he’s imaginary. He’s been my illusionary companion since I got shot in the head some years back and is only good for back-chat and bad advice, but at that time he wisely kept his little mouth shut.
I waited for the killer to show himself and finsih the job, straining my ears for a tell-tale footstep or squeaking floorboard. The office window was wide open against the late summer heat but I didn’t fancy a two-storey drop onto the awning of Shyer’s Deli and if I made a grab for the luger it was fifty-fifty the damn thing would just jam.
Out of options, out of luck. There was just my breathing and the sway of light from the rocking desk lamp I’d knocked over when diving for the floor, plus the regular stab of neon from the hotel sign over the road.
Then I heard the outer door close and let out a heart-felt sigh of relief. The waste basket spoke; a low-rumble of barely disguised contempt.
“Gutless jerk. You could have stood behind the door and strangled whoever offed the kid with the phone cord.”
I threw a noodle-wrapped fork in the Imp’s general direction.
“Can it, small fry! I didn’t see you exactly leaping to my defence. Looking for the number of a good funeral home, maybe?”
“Naw, you ain’t worth the effort. A loser like you is sure to end up as landfill, or maybe just an unidentifiable body dumped in a storm drain. Although I will miss the chance to dance on your grave, now I come to think of it.”
I cursed the little grey runt under my breath and hauled the phone down from my desk - time to call the law.
Two uniforms keep me company in the outer office until the detectives arrived. The grey-haired sergeant was a vet as well and we swapped outrageous war stories for the benefit of the rookie he was teamed up with. The medical examiner came and went, leaving the meat-wagon boys cooling their heels for the moment. The Imp fussed about in the background; untying a shoe lace, easing out a bill-fold to fall on the floor, hiding a pen - generally making a nuisance of himself.
Homicide sent over Harland and Wolff – a pairing that was proof positive their lieutenant had a sense of humour, although I was the only one who seemed to share the joke. Harland was all bull-necked muscle in an ill-fitting suit, who owed his shield to the fact his sister was dating the Assistant Commissioner. That didn’t stop him throwing his weight about like he was a real detective, especially with any poor saps he’d served with while in uniform.
Detective First Grade D.J. Wolff, however, was the real deal. A sharp cookie by all accounts; Jesuit educated, quiet spoken and with a way of looking at you like he’d heard it all before. With him I couldn’t just spin a line that would sound plausible in court, my account of events would actually have to be vaguely believable.
Harland came barging in, straight past us and into the inner office, stomping all over the place like the words ‘crime scene’ weren’t in his vocabulary. Wolff stood by the main door, watching, the very picture of long-suffering resignation. Having completed his ‘investigation’, Harland grabbed my shirt and jerked me to my feet with a hand the size of a dinner plate.
“So what happened, shamus? Why you plug the kid? Maybe he didn’t like you dating his sister, or his mom. Or maybe he’s one of your so-called informants and he didn’t like backing up your allegations against decent cops?”
I put my hand on his, as if to pull it away from my shirt, although I had as much chance of doing so as prising open a vice using a toothpick.
“The advantage of being a private investigator, Harland, is that I don’t have to answer your questions without my lawyer being present. But for the benefit of detective Wolff here, it should be obvious that the blood stains on my shirt indicate I was facing the deceased when he was shot. From behind. Get me?”
Harland glowered and tightened his grip to the point I could feel the fabric of my cheap shirt start to tear, but I could see the flicker of doubt in his eyes and he glanced over to Wolff, who nodded.
“Mr Helath is right, I’m afraid. Even a cursory inspection of the remaining evidence would seem to indicate that he can’t be the killer.”
Harland released me with a bad-tempered grunt and stood back, cracking his knuckles in what he hoped was an intimidating manner. I wasn’t impressed, but ask me again if the two of us were ever alone in a locked interview room. Having established who was the bad cop, detective Wolff at least had the good grace not to try cozying up to me, so to speak. His tone remained neutral and his pale blue eyes were like ice.
“So, obvious questions first. Did you know the deceased?”
And that was the question I’d been dreading. The honest answer was one I’d been turning over in my mind while waiting, trying to find some way of keeping the past where it belonged. I tried for a grim smile but all I managed was a nervous twitch of the lips.
“To tell you the truth, detective, I only saw him for a split second before the gunshot, but he did seem awfully familiar.”
Wolff nodded and fished out his pocket book.
“You have a name then, for this familiar face?”
I sighed.
“He looks like me, back when I was fifteen.”
In the background the Imp started to laugh.
One
Death can be indifferent but a murder, well, that’s always personal.
The trick is to avoid being an eye-witness, but it was going to be hard pulling off the ‘innocent bystander’ routine with a blood-splattered corpse on my office carpet. I’d stayed late at the office, the alternatives being a dull evening alone in my flea-pit apartment or getting hammered in Rosie’s Bar, again. So I’d scored some Chinese and just kicked-back; jacket off, feet up, forking in noodles and getting sauce stains down my shirtfront. No big deal as I’d worn it for the last two days and it needed changing anyway. I was contemplating something stronger to drink than the can of soda when a shadow fell across the blotter and I looked up – right into the face of my past.
There was a teenager standing in the doorway, just a kid, really, in jeans and plaid shirt hanging loose. Before he could speak some joker in the darkened outer office shot him, bam, just like that. A small calibre weapon, and silenced; in through the back of the skull and out through the left eye, leaving me with blood and brains in my food and a body on the floor.
I hit the deck, noodles in the air, seeking cover behind the empty water cooler. For the umpteenth time I cursed the fact they wouldn’t let me carry a gun and wondered if I could risk scuttling over to get the buckshee luger that my partner Jimmy keeps taped beneath his desk. The Imp dived off a filing cabinet into the over-flowing waste basket and burrowed in, but I didn’t have to worry about him as I know he’s imaginary. He’s been my illusionary companion since I got shot in the head some years back and is only good for back-chat and bad advice, but at that time he wisely kept his little mouth shut.
I waited for the killer to show himself and finsih the job, straining my ears for a tell-tale footstep or squeaking floorboard. The office window was wide open against the late summer heat but I didn’t fancy a two-storey drop onto the awning of Shyer’s Deli and if I made a grab for the luger it was fifty-fifty the damn thing would just jam.
Out of options, out of luck. There was just my breathing and the sway of light from the rocking desk lamp I’d knocked over when diving for the floor, plus the regular stab of neon from the hotel sign over the road.
Then I heard the outer door close and let out a heart-felt sigh of relief. The waste basket spoke; a low-rumble of barely disguised contempt.
“Gutless jerk. You could have stood behind the door and strangled whoever offed the kid with the phone cord.”
I threw a noodle-wrapped fork in the Imp’s general direction.
“Can it, small fry! I didn’t see you exactly leaping to my defence. Looking for the number of a good funeral home, maybe?”
“Naw, you ain’t worth the effort. A loser like you is sure to end up as landfill, or maybe just an unidentifiable body dumped in a storm drain. Although I will miss the chance to dance on your grave, now I come to think of it.”
I cursed the little grey runt under my breath and hauled the phone down from my desk - time to call the law.
- - -
Two uniforms keep me company in the outer office until the detectives arrived. The grey-haired sergeant was a vet as well and we swapped outrageous war stories for the benefit of the rookie he was teamed up with. The medical examiner came and went, leaving the meat-wagon boys cooling their heels for the moment. The Imp fussed about in the background; untying a shoe lace, easing out a bill-fold to fall on the floor, hiding a pen - generally making a nuisance of himself.
Homicide sent over Harland and Wolff – a pairing that was proof positive their lieutenant had a sense of humour, although I was the only one who seemed to share the joke. Harland was all bull-necked muscle in an ill-fitting suit, who owed his shield to the fact his sister was dating the Assistant Commissioner. That didn’t stop him throwing his weight about like he was a real detective, especially with any poor saps he’d served with while in uniform.
Detective First Grade D.J. Wolff, however, was the real deal. A sharp cookie by all accounts; Jesuit educated, quiet spoken and with a way of looking at you like he’d heard it all before. With him I couldn’t just spin a line that would sound plausible in court, my account of events would actually have to be vaguely believable.
Harland came barging in, straight past us and into the inner office, stomping all over the place like the words ‘crime scene’ weren’t in his vocabulary. Wolff stood by the main door, watching, the very picture of long-suffering resignation. Having completed his ‘investigation’, Harland grabbed my shirt and jerked me to my feet with a hand the size of a dinner plate.
“So what happened, shamus? Why you plug the kid? Maybe he didn’t like you dating his sister, or his mom. Or maybe he’s one of your so-called informants and he didn’t like backing up your allegations against decent cops?”
I put my hand on his, as if to pull it away from my shirt, although I had as much chance of doing so as prising open a vice using a toothpick.
“The advantage of being a private investigator, Harland, is that I don’t have to answer your questions without my lawyer being present. But for the benefit of detective Wolff here, it should be obvious that the blood stains on my shirt indicate I was facing the deceased when he was shot. From behind. Get me?”
Harland glowered and tightened his grip to the point I could feel the fabric of my cheap shirt start to tear, but I could see the flicker of doubt in his eyes and he glanced over to Wolff, who nodded.
“Mr Helath is right, I’m afraid. Even a cursory inspection of the remaining evidence would seem to indicate that he can’t be the killer.”
Harland released me with a bad-tempered grunt and stood back, cracking his knuckles in what he hoped was an intimidating manner. I wasn’t impressed, but ask me again if the two of us were ever alone in a locked interview room. Having established who was the bad cop, detective Wolff at least had the good grace not to try cozying up to me, so to speak. His tone remained neutral and his pale blue eyes were like ice.
“So, obvious questions first. Did you know the deceased?”
And that was the question I’d been dreading. The honest answer was one I’d been turning over in my mind while waiting, trying to find some way of keeping the past where it belonged. I tried for a grim smile but all I managed was a nervous twitch of the lips.
“To tell you the truth, detective, I only saw him for a split second before the gunshot, but he did seem awfully familiar.”
Wolff nodded and fished out his pocket book.
“You have a name then, for this familiar face?”
I sighed.
“He looks like me, back when I was fifteen.”
In the background the Imp started to laugh.
