Hunter nodded. ‘He knew exactly what he could and could not say. And nothing he did say is actionable on our part. Every incriminating question he asked himself was answered with either
maybe
,
perhaps
or
possibly.
He suggested a lot, but gave us nothing.’
‘We should take him in on “probable cause” anyway, and let him sit in a cell for a while just to teach his arrogant ass a lesson,’ Garcia said, unlocking his car.
‘That was probably what he wanted us to do, Carlos.’ Hunter got in and closed the door. ‘In such a high-profile case, it would’ve been excellent publicity for him and his company. I’m sure he had his lawyers sitting around the phone, just waiting for the call. If we had taken him in, he would’ve been back in his office within the hour, but not before his PA had contacted every newspaper and TV station she could get hold of. His arrest would’ve been deemed as a desperate action from our part, embarrassing the department and earning us a severe ass chewing from high up, if not suspension.’
‘Well,’ Garcia said. ‘I have a very bad feeling about this guy. I think that we should put him under surveillance.’
‘He’s too well prepared, Carlos. He knows that we can’t do that. We don’t have anything to justify the request and the expenditure, other than his arrogance.’
‘And a hell of a gut feeling.’ Garcia started his car and ran an anxious hand over his mouth. ‘Isn’t that what this killer has been doing all along, Robert – playing us from the start? He’s always been a step ahead of us. Like a chess player. He hasn’t made a move yet without first pondering what our response would be. And it looks like he’s got it right every time.’
Hunter said nothing.
‘Well, that’s exactly what Paulsen did to us in there.’
‘I know.’
Hunter’s phone rang in his pocket.
‘Detective Hunter, Homicide Special.’
He listened for a moment before disconnecting and looking at Garcia. ‘They’ve found yesterday’s victim’s body.’
Garcia’s eyes widened. ‘Where?’
‘Maywood.’
Eighty-Eight
The body had been found by a construction worker refurbishing a small, single-story, two-bedroom house near the Atlantic Bridge in Maywood. The killer had placed the dismembered arms inside a heavy-duty black-plastic bag, wrapped the body up in more of the same bags, and dumped everything inside the medium-sized construction dumpster that had been placed in the house’s backyard.
The press was already out there in force, and as Hunter and Garcia stepped out of the car they were hit by a wall of shouted questions and a thunder of camera clicks. Neither detective so much as glanced in the direction of the ravenous pack of reporters.
‘There isn’t much to see here,’ Mike Brindle, the same lead forensics agent from the previous two scenes, said as Hunter and Garcia reached the house’s backyard. He looked ready to leave. ‘At least not forensically. The killer never even entered the premises.’
‘How come?’ Garcia asked.
‘Well, the body was all wrapped up like a postal package,’ Brindle explained. ‘And then dumped inside that construction dumpster over there.’ He indicated the bright red dumpster at the end of the small yard. It looked to be about ten foot long, seven or eight wide and maybe five high. Two uniformed officers were standing to its right.
Hunter, Garcia and Brindle made their way toward it.
‘As you can see,’ Brindle continued, ‘the dumpster is pushed back against the yard’s back wall, which is only about a foot higher than the dumpster itself.’
‘The killer drove up the back alley,’ Hunter said, anticipating what Brindle was about to say.
‘That’s right,’ Brindle confirmed. ‘Nice and dark, easy to access, no one to bother him. He stops his vehicle directly behind the house, drags the body and the arms out of the car and quickly throws them over the wall and into the dumpster. Job done. Back into the car, and he’s gone. The whole thing would’ve taken less than a minute.’ Brindle pulled a cigarette out of his pocket, lit it up and took a long drag, letting the smoke escape as he spoke. ‘This killer is a planner. He’d probably been driving around for a few days, scouting for a place to dump his next victim. This house is at the beginning of the road, easy to spot from both sides, front and back. Anyone driving by can see that it’s empty and being refurbished. The bright red dumpster is also easily spotted from outside.’
‘And because it’s being refurbished,’ Hunter added, ‘the killer knew that if he dumped the body late at night, it would be found the next day by the working force.’
Brindle nodded and took another drag. ‘We’ve checked the back alley already. There’s nothing there. Solid asphalt, no tire marks or footprints. A few cigarette butts and gum wrappers, but none directly behind the house. I wouldn’t hope for much.’
They looked inside the dumpster – plasterboards, wood pieces, red bricks, broken tiles, rags and empty cans of paint.
‘The body?’ Garcia asked.
‘On its way to the coroner’s. You’ve missed it by—’ Brindle glanced at his watch ‘—twenty-five minutes. No point checking it here. The body was well wrapped up. If there are any forensics clues to be found, they’ll be on the body itself, or on the inside of the plastic bags. Better to properly unwrap it under a controlled environment.’
‘And you’re sure it’s our victim?’
‘It’s the victim, all right,’ Brindle said, retrieving a digital camera from his bag. He turned it on, switched it to view mode and handed it to Hunter. ‘I cut open enough of the plastic wrapper to expose the head.’
The first picture was a close-up of the man’s face. His eyes had already started to sink into his skull, and the skin around his face and neck had taken a greenish-blue color, making him look like an alien, or a horror film prop, but there were still enough features there for Hunter and Garcia to recognize him. They slowly flipped through the rest of the photographs – a few more close-ups, followed by some wide-angle shots.
‘I’ll email these to you as soon as I get back to the lab,’ Brindle said, checking his watch again.
‘Who found the body?’ Hunter asked, handing the camera back to the forensics agent.
‘The builder who’s refurbishing the house.’ Brindle pointed with his right index finger. ‘He’s in the kitchen with an officer.’
Hunter nodded and turned to face Garcia. ‘Do we have any of those printouts of the victim we handed the press yesterday?’
‘We have a few in the car, yes.’
‘Great, let’s get some of the uniforms to go around this street and some of the neighboring ones too. Maybe the victim was a local. Maybe that’s why the killer chose this house to dump the body.’
‘I’ll go get them,’ Garcia said, already making his way outside again.
Eighty-Nine
The door-to-door gave them nothing. No neighbor or shopkeeper in the vicinity of the house could offer any information regarding the victim’s identity. Many of them had already seen his picture in the morning paper or, worse, had watched the killer’s broadcast the day before.
Garcia interviewed the construction worker who’d found the body. He was a strong man, in his early thirties with tattooed arms, a shaved head and a bushy blond mustache. He and his father owned the small refurbishing company he worked for, and he’d been doing the same job for over fifteen years. He’d been working on that house for only five days, and the job was expected to last no more than another four.
The house belonged to a small property developer, Akil Banerjee, who for the past four years had been investing in disused and repossessed properties, cheaply refurbishing them and selling them on for a small profit.
Both the property owner and the construction worker checked out. They also had solid alibis for their whereabouts overnight and at the time the killer was on the phone to Hunter yesterday. But as Hunter and Garcia got back into the car, Hunter received a new phone call. This time it was Homicide Detective Mario Perez.
‘Robert, I think we’ve got an ID on your victim.’
‘I’m listening.’
‘Are you in your car?’ Perez asked.
‘No, in Detective Garcia’s car.’
‘OK, I’m emailing you a few pictures now.’
Hunter switched the call to loudspeaker and used the car’s police computer to log into his email.
‘With the press and the media appealing for people to come forward, we’ve been getting calls all day,’ Perez clarified. ‘As expected, most of them have been crackpots, attention seekers or people who couldn’t be one hundred percent sure, you know how it goes – except one.’
‘Go on.’
‘A restaurant owner called Paolo Ghirardelli called a couple of hours back. He owns a pizzeria in Norwalk. I was the one who spoke to him. He was absolutely positive that the man in the picture that came out in the papers today was one of his waiters – Ethan Walsh. He hasn’t turned up for work in two days. Hasn’t answered his phone either. Mr. Ghirardelli is one of those proud Italians who has framed photographs of everyone who works for him, kitchen staff included, hanging on his restaurant wall. He emailed me Ethan Walsh’s picture, and . . . you can see for yourself.’
Hunter opened the email and the first of its three attachments – a colored photograph of a man in his early thirties with an oval-shaped face, a round nose, plump cheeks, thin eyebrows and short darkish hair. He and Garcia stared at it in silence for a long moment, and reflexively, but not that they needed to, checked the snapshot printout they’d been showing around the streets for the past few hours. Neither one had any doubts.
‘It’s him,’ Garcia said at last. ‘Or an identical twin.’
‘Ethan Walsh’s got no brothers or sisters,’ Perez confirmed. ‘I’ve already done a preliminary check on him. That’s the second attachment to the email. And it turns out that he used to be an expert computer programmer.’
‘He was an expert computer programmer?’ Garcia interjected.
‘That’s right.’
‘What’s an expert computer programmer doing working as a waiter in a pizzeria in Norwalk?’
‘If you open the second attachment, you’ll see our official details sheet on Ethan Walsh,’ Perez replied as Hunter double clicked on it. ‘The third attachment is a quick selection of a few Internet articles I found on him. That will give you a better idea of why he left games programming behind.’
‘Great work, Mario,’ Hunter said, quickly scanning the fact sheet. ‘Could you carry on and dig out everything you can on this Ethan Walsh?’
‘Already on it. By the time you guys get back here, I should have some more.’
‘Thanks.’ Hunter disconnected.
Ethan Walsh’s registered address was as a tenant in an apartment block in Bellflower, the first neighborhood west of Norwalk. A footnote at the bottom of the email Detective Perez had sent Hunter said that just to be sure, Perez had already contacted the Bellflower police station and asked them to send a black and white unit to knock on Ethan Walsh’s door. There had been no reply.
The fact sheet also carried the name, address and phone number for Ethan Walsh’s landlord – Mr. Stanislaw Reuben. Hunter lost no time in calling him, and Mr. Reuben told Hunter that he could meet them at Ethan Walsh’s address in an hour.
Ninety
Hunter and Garcia made it to Bellflower in south Los Angeles just as the sun was starting to set over Venice Beach. The apartment block Ethan Walsh used to live in was an old and dirty brick building in dire need of some repairs, located at the end of an unglamorous street.
Mr. Stanislaw Reuben, Ethan’s landlord, met the detectives by the entrance to the building’s lobby. The man had an undeniable seediness to him, with ill-fitting clothes, a pockmarked face and a lip marred by a scar. His throaty voice sounded like it had come straight out of a horror film.
‘I thought that the man I saw in the paper this morning looked rather familiar,’ Mr. Reuben said after Hunter and Garcia identified themselves. ‘I suspected that he might’ve been one of my tenants, but it was hard to be sure. I have so many, and I only see them once or twice a year, really. Most of my tenants post me predated checks a few months in advance. I find it easier that way.’
‘And that was how Mr. Walsh paid his rent?’ Garcia queried.
‘That was indeed.’ Mr. Reuben smiled, showing badly cared-for teeth.
‘How long has he been a tenant of yours?’ Garcia followed up.
‘Not long at all. Just over six months. Seemed like a nice tenant too. Quiet, no complaints . . .’ Mr. Reuben pinched his left earlobe a couple of times. ‘It’s him, isn’t it? The man who was killed on the Internet? That was my tenant, Mr. Walsh, wasn’t it?’ He sounded truly excited.
‘We can’t be certain at this time,’ Garcia replied.
‘Do you think I’ll get interviewed by TV?’ His excitement grew. ‘I’ve never been on TV.’
‘And that’s not such a bad thing,’ Garcia said, gesturing toward the building. ‘Shall we?’
The landlord used his key to unlock the lobby door and ushered the detectives inside. The confined space smelled of cat piss with something else that carried an acid undertone.
Garcia wrinkled his nose while his eyes quickly searched the dusky lobby as if he was expecting to identify the source of the smell.
‘I suggest we take the stairs up,’ Mr. Reuben said. ‘That elevator is very small, and I wouldn’t really risk it, if you know what I mean.’
The stairs were dirty and dark, with graffiti decorating the walls all the way up. As they got to the fourth floor, Mr. Reuben led the way down a long and dimly lit corridor. The cat piss smell from the downstairs lobby was replicated there, but it now had a fetid, sickly quality to it that made both detectives grind their teeth.
It didn’t seem to bother the landlord.
‘Here we are,’ he said as they reached a door three-quarters of the way down the hallway. The number on it read 4113. Mr. Reuben unlocked the door and pushed it open. With the windows shut and the curtains pulled to, the room before them was hidden in shadows, and the built-up heat made it feel like a prison cell even before they stepped inside.
Mr. Reuben hit the lights, revealing a small living area, with a tiny kitchen to the left. The room was sparsely decorated. There was an old wooden table, four wooden chairs, a small stereo, a sofa with a flowery cover thrown over it, a portable TV set and a chest of drawers, on which a few picture frames had been placed. There were no immediate signs of a disturbance. The walls were bare, save for a picture of Ethan Walsh with a little girl who looked to be around three years old.