The Forgotten Man Read online

"How'd you get my number?"

  I had changed my home number when the news stories broke, but reporters and cranks still called.

  "One of the criminalists had it or got it, I'm not sure. Either way, I'm sorry for calling like this, but we have a homicide. We have reason to believe you know the deceased."

  Something sharp stabbed behind my eyes, and I swung my feet to the floor.

  "Who is it?"

  "We'd like you to come down here, see for yourself. We're downtown near Twelfth and Hill Street. I can send a radio car if that would help."

  The house was dark. Sliding glass doors opened to a deck that jutted like a diving platform over the canyon behind my house. The lights on the opposite ridge were murky with the low clouds and mist. I cleared my throat again.

  "Is it Joe Pike?"

  "Pike's your partner, right? The ex-cop with the sunglasses?"

  "Yes. He has arrows tattooed on the outside of his delts. They're red."

  She covered the phone, but I heard muffled voices. She was asking. My chest filled with a growing pressure, and I didn't like that she had to ask because asking meant maybe it was.

  "Is it Pike?"

  "No, this isn't Pike. This man has tattoos, but not like that. I'm sorry if I scared you that way. Listen, we can send a car."

  I closed my eyes, letting the pressure fade.

  "I don't know anything about it. What makes you think I know?"

  "The victim said some things before he died. Come down and take a look. I'll send a car."

  "Am I a suspect?"

  "Nothing like that. We just want to see if you can help with the ID."

  "What was your name?"

  "Diaz—"

  "Okay, Diaz—it's four in the morning, I haven't slept in two months, and I'm not in the mood. If you think I know this guy, then you think I'm a suspect. Everyone who knows a homicide victim is a suspect until they're cleared, so just tell me who you got and ask whatever it is you want to ask."

  "What it is, we have a deceased Anglo male we believe to be the victim of a robbery. They got his wallet, so I can't give you a name. We're hoping you can help with that part. Here, listen—"

  "Why do you think I know him?"

  She plowed on with the description as if I hadn't spoken.

  "Anglo male, dyed black hair thin on top, brown eyes, approximately seventy years but he could be older, I guess, and he has crucifix tattoos on both palms."

  "Why do you think I know him?"

  "He has more tats of a religious nature on his arms—Jesus, the Virgin, things like that. None of this sounds familiar?"

  "I don't have any idea who you're talking about."

  "What we have is a deceased male as I've described, one gunshot to the chest. By his appearance and location, he appears indigent, but we're working on that. I'm the officer who found him. He was still conscious at that time and said things that suggested you would recognize his description."

  "I don't."

  "Look, Cole, I'm not trying to be difficult. It would be better if—"

  "What did he say?"

  Diaz didn't answer right away.

  "He told me he was your father."

  I sat without moving in my dark house. I had started that night in bed, but ended on the couch, hoping the steady patter of rain would quiet my heart, but sleep had not come.

  "Just like that, he told you he was my father."

  "I tried to get a statement, but all he said was something about you being his son, and then he passed. You're the same Elvis Cole they wrote the stories about, aren't you? In the Times?"

  "Yes."

  "He had the clippings. I figured you would recognize the tats if you knew him, me thinking he was your father, but it sounds like you don't."

  My voice came out hoarse, and the catch embarrassed me.

  "I never met my father. I don't know anything about him, and as far as I know he doesn't know me."

  "We want you to come take a look, Mr. Cole. We have a few questions."

  "I thought I wasn't a suspect."

  "At this time, you aren't, but we still have the questions. We sent a radio car. It should be pulling up just about now."

  Approaching headlights brightened my kitchen as she said it. I heard the car roll to a slow stop outside my house, and more light filled my front entry. They had radioed their status, and someone with Diaz had signaled their arrival.

  "Okay, Diaz, tell them to shut their lights. No point in waking the neighbors."

  "The car is a courtesy, Mr. Cole. In case you were unable to drive after you saw him."

  "Sure. That's why you kept offering the car like it was my choice even though it was already coming."

  "It's still your choice. If you want to take your own car you can follow them. We just have a few questions."

  The glow outside vanished, and once more my home was in darkness.

  "Okay, Diaz, I'm coming. Tell them to take it easy out there. I have to get dressed.

  "Not a problem. We'll see you in a few minutes."

  I put down the phone but still did not move. I had not moved in hours. Outside, a light rain fell as quietly as a whisper. I must have been waiting for Diaz to call. Why else would I have been awake that night and all the other nights except to wait like a lost child in the woods, a forgotten child waiting to be found?

  After a while I dressed, then followed the radio car to see the dead.

  2

  The police were set up at both ends of an alley across from a flower shop that had opened to receive its morning deliveries. Yellow tape was stretched across the alley to keep people out even though the streets were deserted; the only people I saw were four workers from the flower mart and the cops. I followed the radio car past an SID van, more radio cars, and a couple of Crown Victorias to park across the street. No rain was falling there in the heart of the city, but the clouds hung low, and threatened.

  The uniforms climbed out of their radio car and told me to wait at the tape. The senior officer went into the alley for the detectives, but his younger partner stayed with me. We hadn't spoken at my house, but now he studied me with his thumbs hooked onto his gun belt.

  "You the one was on TV?"

  "No, he was the other one."

  "I wasn't trying to be rude. I remember seeing you on the news."

  I didn't say anything. He watched me a moment longer, then turned to the alley.

  "Guess you've seen a homicide scene before."

  "More than one."

  The body was crumpled beside a Dumpster midway down the alley, but my view was blocked by a woman in a T-shirt and shorts, and two men in dark sport coats. The woman's T-shirt was fresh and white, and made her stand out in the dingy alley as if she were on fire. The older suit was a thick man with shabby hair, and the younger detective was a tall, spike-straight guy with a pinched face. When the uniform reached them, they traded a few words, then the woman came back with him. She smelled of medicinal alcohol.

  "I'm Diaz. Thanks for coming out."

  Kelly Diaz had short black hair, blunt fingers, and the chunky build of an aging athlete. A delicate silver heart swayed on a chain around her neck. It didn't go with the rest of her.

  I said, "I'm not going to know this man."

  "I'd still like you to take a look and answer a few questions. You okay with that?"

  "I wouldn't be here if I wasn't."

  "I'm just making sure you understand you don't have to talk to us. You have any doubts about it you should call a lawyer."

  "I'm good, Diaz. If I wasn't good, I would have shot it out with these guys up in the hills."

  The younger cop laughed, but his partner didn't. Diaz lifted the tape, and I stooped under and walked with her to the Dumpster. When we reached the others, Diaz introduced us. The senior detective was a Central Station homicide supervisor named Terry O'Loughlin; the other guy was a D-l named Jeff Pardy. O'Loughlin shook my hand and thanked me for coming, but Pardy didn't offer to shake. He stood between
me and the body like I was an invading army and he was determined not to give ground.

  O'Loughlin said, "Okay, let him see."

  The cops parted like a dividing sea so I could view the body. The alley was bright with lights they had set up to work the scene. The dead man was on his right side with his right arm stretched from his chest and his left down along his side; his shirt was wet with blood and had been scissored open. His head was shaped like an upside-down pyramid with a broad forehead and pointy chin. His hair showed the stark black of a bad dye job and a thin widow's peak. He didn't look particularly old, just weathered and sad. The crucifix inked into his left palm made it look like he was holding the cross, and more tattoos showed on his stomach under the blood. A single gunshot wound was visible two inches to the left of his sternum.

  Diaz said, "You know him?"

  I cocked my head to see him as if we were looking at each other. His eyes were open and would remain that way until a mortician closed them. They were brown, like mine, but dulled by the loss of their tears. That's the first thing you learn when you work with the dead: We're gone when we no longer cry.

  "What do you think? You know this guy?"

  "Uh-uh."

  "Ever seen him before?"

  "No, I can't help you."

  When I looked up, all three of them were watching me.

  O'Loughlin flicked his hand at Pardy.

  "Show him the stories."

  Pardy took a manila envelope from his coat. The envelope contained three articles about me and a little boy who had been kidnapped earlier in the fall. The articles hadn't been clipped from the original newspaper; they had been copied, and the articles clipped from the copies. All three articles made me out to be more than I was or ever had been; Elvis Cole, the World's Greatest Detective, hero of the week. I had seen them before, and seeing them again depressed me. I handed them back without reading them.

  "Okay, he had some news clips about me. Looks like he copied them at the library."

  Diaz continued staring at me.

  "He told me he was trying to find you."

  "When this stuff hit the news I got calls from total strangers saying I owed them money and asking for loans. I got death threats, fan letters, and time-share offers, also from total strangers. After the first fifty letters I threw away my mail without opening it and turned off my answering machine. I don't know what else to tell you. I've never seen him before."

  O'Loughlin said, "Maybe he hung around outside your office. You could have seen him there."

  "I stopped going to my office."

  "You have any idea why he would think he's your father?"

  "Why would total strangers think I'd loan them money?"

  Pardy said, "Were you down here or anywhere near here tonight?"

  There it was. The coroner's office was responsible for identifying John Doe victims and notifying their next of kin. Whenever the police took action to identify a victim, they were acting to further their investigation. Diaz had phoned me at four A.M. to see if I was home; she had sent a car to confirm I was home, and asked me down so they could gauge my reaction. They might even have a witness squirreled nearby, giving me the eye.

  I said, "I was home all night, me and my cat."

  Pardy edged closer.

  "Can the cat confirm it?"

  "Ask him."

  Diaz said, "Take it soft, Pardy. Jesus."

  O'Loughlin warned off Pardy with a look.

  "I don't want this to become adversarial. Cole knows we have to cover the base. He's going out of his way."

  I said, "I was home all night. I spoke to a friend about nine-thirty. I can give you his name and number, but that's the only time I can cover."

  Pardy glanced at O'Loughlin, but didn't seem particularly impressed.

  "That's great, Cole; we'll check it out. Would you be willing to give us a GSR? In the interest of helping us. Not to be adversarial."

  O'Loughlin frowned at him, but didn't object. A gunshot residue test would show them whether or not I had recently fired a gun—if I hadn't washed my hands or worn gloves.

  "Sure, Pardy, take the swabs. I haven't killed anyone this week."

  O'Loughlin checked his watch as if he suspected this was going to be a waste of time, but here we were and there was the dead man. Diaz called over a criminalist, and had me sign a waiver stating I knew my rights and was cooperating without coercion. The criminalist rubbed two cloth swabs over my left and right hands, then dropped each into its own glass tube. While the criminalist worked, I gave Pardy Joe Pike's name and number to confirm the call, then asked O'Loughlin if they made the murder for a botched robbery. He checked his watch again as if answering me was just another waste of time.

  "We don't make it for anything right now. We're six blocks from Skid Row, Cole. We have more murders down here than any other part of the city. These people will kill each other over six cents or a blow job, and every goddamned murder clears the same. He sure as hell wasn't carrying government secrets."

  No, he was carrying news stories about me.

  "Sounds like you've got it figured out."

  "If you'd seen as many killings down here as me, you'd have it figured, too."

  O'Loughlin suddenly realized he was talking too much and seemed embarrassed.

  "If we think of anything else to ask you, we'll follow up. Thanks for your cooperation."

  "Sure."

  He glanced at Diaz.

  "Kelly, you good with letting Jeff have the lead on this? It'll be a good learning experience."

  "Fine by me."

  "You good with that, Jeff?"

  "You bet. I'm on it."

  Pardy turned away to call over the coroner's people, and O'Loughlin went with him. Two morgue techs broke out a gurney and began setting it up. I studied the body again. His clothes were worn but clean, and his face wasn't burned dark like the people who live on the streets. When I glanced up at Diaz, she was staring at him, too.

  "He doesn't look homeless."

  "He's probably fresh out of detention. That's good news for us; his prints will be in the system."

  The alley was a long block between commercial storefronts and an abandoned hotel. The letters from the old neon HOTEL sign loomed over the dark street. I could read the hotel's faded name painted on the bricks—Hotel Farnham. But without the police lights, it would have been impossible to read. The darkness bothered me. The body was a good sixty feet from the near street, so he either took a shortcut he knew well or came with someone else. It would have been scary to come this way alone.

  "It was you who found him?"

  "I was over on Grand when I heard the shot—one cap. I ran past at first, but I heard him flopping around in here and there he was. I tried to get a handle on the bleeding, but it was too much. It was awful, man ... Jesus."

  She raised her hands like she was trying to get them out of the blood, and I saw they were shaking. The clothes she wore were probably spares from another cop's trunk. She had probably changed out of her bloody clothes in the ambulance and washed with the alcohol. She probably wanted to throw away her blood-soaked clothes, but she was a cop with a cop's pay so she would wash them herself when she got home, then have them dry-cleaned and hope the blood came out. Diaz turned away. The coroner techs had their gurney up, and were pulling on latex gloves.

  I said, "No wallet?"

  "No, they got it. All he had were the clippings, a nickel, and two pennies."

  "No keys?"

  She suddenly sighed, and seemed anxious and tired.

  "Nothing. Look, you can take off, Cole. I want to finish up and get home to bed. It's been a long night."

  I didn't move.

  "He mentioned me by name?"

  "That's right."

  "What did he say?"

  "I don't remember exactly, something about trying to find you, but I was asking what happened—I was asking about the shooter. He said he had to find his son. He said he had come all this way to find his boy
, and he never met you, but he wanted to make up the lost years. I asked him who, and he told me your name. Maybe that isn't exactly what he said, but it was something like that."

  She glanced at me again, then looked back at his body.

  "Listen, Cole, I've arrested people who thought they were from Mars. I've busted people who thought they were on Mars. You heard O'Loughlin—we got bums, junkies, drunks, crackheads, schizophrenics, you name it, down here. You don't know what kind of mental illness this guy had."

  "But you still have to clear me."

  "If you were home all night, don't worry about it. He'll be in the system. I'll let you know when the CI pulls a name."

  I turned away from the body and saw Pardy staring at me. His pinched face looked intent.

  "It's not necessary, Diaz. Don't bother."

  "You sure? I don't mind."

  "I'm sure."

  "Okay, well, whatever; your call."

  I started back to my car, but she stopped me.

  "Hey, Cole?"

  "What?"

  "I read the articles. That was some hairy stuff, man, what you did saving that boy. Congratulations."

  I walked away without answering, but stopped again when I reached the yellow tape. Diaz had joined O'Loughlin and Pardy as the coroner's people bagged the body.

  "Diaz."

  She and Pardy both turned. Rigor had frozen the corpse. The techs leaned hard on the arms to fold them into the bag. A hand reached out from the dark blue plastic like it was pointing at me. They pushed it inside and pulled the zipper.

  "When you get the ID, let me know."

  I left them to finish their job.

  3

  Early in the fall, three men stole my girlfriend's only son, Ben Chenier. An ex-LAPD officer named Joe Pike and I saved the boy, but many people died, including the three kidnappers. Bad enough, but those three men had been hired by Ben's own father and were not your garden-variety criminals—they were professional mercenaries wanted under the International War Crimes Act. What with all the bodies, Joe and I faced felony charges, but the governments of Sierra Leone and Colombia interceded along with—get this—the United Nations. The lurid nature of a father contracting the abduction of his own child fed a wildfire of sensationalist journalism, but even before the worst of it, Lucy Chenier concluded that life with yours truly was not worth the risk, so she took her son and went home. She was right to leave. Being with me wasn't worth a four A.M. phone call saying a murdered stranger claimed to be the father I never knew.