Ch.5: Every Time That Feeling Start
July 5th, 1955
The fog in his head wasn't solely from the sudden loss of hearing, but from his lack of memory. He'd been trying for the past hour to remember everything that had happened on Sunday. There were bits and pieces filled in but not everything. He remembered getting the address for where Ray Langston had Thomas Harcourt stashed, but he didn't remember the actual address, location, or what they had talked about. The next thing he remembered was being at Marty's Treasure Trove.
He couldn't remember the conversation with Mr. Harcourt, but he was remembering the conversation with Marty at the store.
In a two-story building on the corner of Bush and Webster, just east of Fillmore Street, he walked under a pale red awning over the display windows that read "Marty's Treasure Trove". Entering through the door, he immediately smelled wood varnish. His eyes took in the treasures the store sold and he noticed that most if not all were either made of wood or had wood elements in the product for sale: grandfather clocks, totem poles, hunter's bows and arrows, fishing poles, and wooden boxes and cases that held limited edition objects and handmade jewelry. There were also items made of brass that were polished to the point that he could see not only his reflection but the reflection of the building across the street.
Next to the counter, in a display case, he saw the wooden boxes that were open to show what they held inside. Some held knives, other pens. He was looking for the Egyptian box but didn't see it.
"May I help you?"
He lifted his head and saw a man enter from the back hallway. In his hand was a rag and he was using it to wipe his hands. On his hands was a brown liquid: wood stain. "You must be Marty. I'm Gil Grissom," he said as he took out his wallet and showed his Private Investigator's ID. "I was looking for an Egyptian box."
Marty's eyes brightened up as he said, "I loved working on that one."
"You make the boxes yourself and stain them?" he asked.
"That's right, I do. In my workshop in the back. Everything that's wood in my store, I made myself. That China cabinet," Marty said as he pointed to the China cabinet that held a China set inside of it. "Even that grandfather clock. All the engravings in those boxes…I even made the chess pieces for that chess set." He pointed to the chess set that was set up on a display table. It was a wooden box with hinges on one side to lift up the top to store the chess pieces inside the chess board. The pieces appeared to be made out of polished marble.
"And the Egyptian box with a pen…?"
Marty was nodding with a wide smile on his face. "Egyptomania."
"Excuse me?" he asked in confusion.
"After the discovery of the Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922, there was an Egyptian revival of the 1920's. Often considered part of the Art Deco period," Marty was telling him as he grabbed a brass Egyptian pyramid and showed it to him. "The revival's influence was widespread and included furniture and other household objects, as well as writing instruments in addition to architecture—"
"Writing instruments, like a pen? I'm interested—"
"I don't have it anymore. I sold it. This pyramid is for sale," Marty nearly shoved it into his hand.
He glanced at it, smiled slightly, then sat it down, saying, "I'm not interested in the pyramid. I'm interested to know who you sold the pen to."
"The Montblanc Egypt-inspired fountain pen, circa 1920's. The pen featured an octagonal shape and Egyptian-style engravings. The hieroglyphics featured on the barrel were taken from a passage of the "Book of the Dead" of Hunefer, a royal scribe who lived during the 19th century, that's B.C. It is one of the most important findings in Egyptology as it provides insight into the "trials" that needed to be completed in order for an individual to reach the afterlife during the "Judgment Scene". The scene depicted the weighing of the heart to determine if the deceased lived a respectable life, and whether they would gain access to the afterlife." Marty was practically beaming with excitement and pride as he grabbed a photo scrapbook from behind the counter and flipped it open. He searched the pages and placed the book on top of the counter and turned it around to show him. There were two pictures, one of the wooden boxes, and one of the wooden box with the pen. "I etched those hieroglyphics into the wooden box I made for the pen."
The way Marty took great care with his wood work, the attention to detail, and the fact that he took pictures of the finished project and of all the items in his store told him one thing: Marty kept receipts. "This is really a beautiful piece of work, Marty. I'd like to talk to the person who bought it so I can see it in person. Do you think you can help me?"
Marty gave a nod as he turned the page in the book and he saw the receipt attached to the back of the pictures. He really couldn't believe it. "Insurance purposes," he told him. "Stanley Adler. I have his address."
"Why?"
Marty just looked at him and said again, "Insurance purposes. In case I have to get it back."
He realized that Marty was really possessive of the things he made and sold. So much so that he got the name and address of every customer who bought something from him. Marty may have been obsessive, but it worked to his advantage as he got the name of the buyer and his address.
"Are you sure you don't want to buy anything?" Marty asked him before he left. "That chess set maybe?"
"I have a chess set, Marty, but thank you," he said as he left the store and went to a pay phone. He had to call Sara.
He was trying to remember before he talked to Marty. Thomas Harcourt had stashed the minicamera inside that pen box when Marty had showed it to him. Marty had to have been distracted by another customer for Harcourt to have enough time to remove the pen and the foam insert to hide the camera and to put it all back. But why that store? It had to be close to where he was; where he lived or where he worked.
Rubbing his head as he stared at the black counter, he didn't like it that he couldn't remember.
"—but that's just me."
Turning his head, he saw a woman sitting next to him. She was blond, blue eyes, and wore a long black dress. In between her fingers was a cigarette. And she was looking right at him.
There was a smoothness to her movements, her voice, as she asked, "You got a light?"
Reaching over to the counter, he grabbed a pack of matches from a stack that the bartender would've given him if he wasn't helping all the other customers. The matches had the jazz club's name printed on the front and when he flipped it open, the address and phone number printed on the inside. Ripping off a match, he lit it up and held it out for her.
She leaned forward, cigarette between her fingers and mouth, and once her cigarette was lit, she said, "Thank you. My name's Teri, what's yours?"
"Gil." He smirked slightly as he looked toward the stage. Someone else was at the piano playing as another group of musicians were up on the stage playing "Midnight at the Mill". Checking his watch, he saw that it was a few minutes after midnight and wondered if that was always played to ring in the new day. Sitting on the black counter in front of him was a glass with whiskey. It was there, he held the glass in his hand, but ever since he sat down and ordered it nearly an hour ago he'd only drank a few sips.
"Are you waiting on someone, Gil?" the woman asked.
He shook his head and took a drink, nearly downing half of it. The Fillmore District, he thought as he picked up the matches and handed them to the woman. "For later, in case you can't find a guy to do it for you."
He slid off the stool and headed for the door. He remembered that Thomas Harcourt was being stashed in a room somewhere in the Fillmore District. Pushing the door open, he stepped out into the night air and took a breath of smoke that didn't come from a cigarette. It was a sweet earthy skunky smell and as he passed through the smoke, he heard a voice behind him.
"Hey, Grissom, leaving so soon?"
He stopped walking as he turned around and saw Warrick standing on the sidewalk; in his hand was a smoke that wasn't a cigarette. "I have to go to the Fillmore—"
"There's nothing going on over there that you can't get right here," Warrick said as he walked up to him. "We have the best jazz club in town."
"I can't argue with that, but I'm not going for Jazz. I have to talk to someone."
"This is about your case?"
He gave a nod as he told him, "Yeah, uh…thanks, for, uh—"
Warrick waved him off as he asked, "Have you ever been to the Fillmore, like, at night?"
"A few times; why?"
Warrick nearly laughed as he said, "You know the nickname right? "Harlem of the West". No offense, Grissom, but…uh," He made a show of looking him over before saying, "you're gonna have a hard time talking to anyone over there. Hold up, alright, I'll go with you."
"Warrick, I don't—" he stopped as Warrick was already walking inside the building.
He let out a breath as he looked around the block and saw the excitement in the streets and the festivities still going on. The air smelt of gunpowder from all the exploding fireworks and the sky was booming and lighting up like lightning for miles all around him.
Warrick walked back out and he started walking towards the direction of his car as Warrick fell in step with him.
"I thought you had to work?" he asked.
"We have more than one piano player. You're going to need help."
Shaking his head, he told him, "You don't have to help me. You don't even know me."
Warrick glanced over at him as he told him, "I know enough, and the enough I know about you, I like. Besides, I noticed that you haven't been hearing very well lately. You might need someone watching your back."
"How'd—"
"That blond in that black dress? She's been talking to you for like ten minutes and you barely realized she was there. I even tried talking to you before I went out for my smoke break and got no response. I told her to keep talking, you'd eventually hear her." Looking over at him, Warrick asked, "Did you?"
Getting to his car, he told him as he took out his keys, "I heard enough to know that I didn't want to keep talking to her."
Warrick rounded the car; he got in and reached over to unlock the door for him.
He started the car, rolled down the windows, and then headed for the Fillmore District. The district was only two miles down the street but with the traffic and the blocking of roads for the parade, it took him ten minutes longer to get there. Along the way, he didn't do much talking as he tried to remember where exactly in the district the building was located where Mr. Harcourt was being kept. He was certain it was on the top floor above a business...maybe?
"Who you have to go see?"
"A man named Thomas Harcourt," he told Warrick as he finally crossed Van Ness Avenue and entered the district.
There were businesses, restaurants, jazz and blues clubs, and plenty of homes within one of the most diverse neighborhoods of the city. During the war, when Japanese Americans were forced into internment camps, it left a large number of unoccupied homes and businesses in the Fillmore district that was filled by the influx of African Americans from the South, escaping the Jim Crow laws, who traveled out West, particularly coastal areas who sought work at the shipyards. Warrick had been right when he said that the neighborhood was called the "Harlem of the West" as most if not all of the residents who lived and worked there were African American.
There were still Japanese Americans who lived there as well but most moved a few blocks north out of the district in a neighborhood now called Japantown. Much like Chinatown, it was filled with shops and restaurants filled with traditional Japanese cuisines and products and business. Which reminded him, he had to go to both San Francisco State University and Chinatown. He had a hunch about the seeds he'd found on the floor bed of the delivery truck in the back alley behind Madame Masque's Palace.
He drove up and down the streets, hoping something would jar his memory. He could just call Sara, wake her up or disturb her evening with Hank, but decided against it. It was a holiday, and she probably was at home or out. He wasn't going to bother her with this, especially since he did have backup.
And his backup was eyeing him like he was insane. "Are you lost?"
He glanced over at him as he turned down another street. "I can't remember exactly where he was staying. I'm hoping something will jog my memory."
Then he saw a familiar sign on the corner lit up in red and white lights. Slim's Stacks and Jazz. As he stopped at the red light on the corner, he eyed the sign as his memory came back to him.
Pointing to the sign on the side of the Victorian house, he told Sara, "A decade ago, Billie Holiday performed in the back room of this pancake house. Her and many others. Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker, Chet Baker, and Sarah Vaughn to name a few."
"A pancake house?"
"It stops being a pancake house at 2 o'clock in the morning." They went up the steps to the front door. He was looking for a room on the second floor. Room number 4 that was being rented out to a lodger named Thomas Harcourt.
"It's right up here," he told Warrick as he searched around for a parking spot.
Parking nearly three blocks over, they walked back to the building on Fillmore Street. It was an white with blue trim Victorian house. The door off the street led into Slim's Stacks and Jazz which was a pancake house in the front and a jazz club in the back. The pancake house was open during the morning and evening hours. But once two o'clock in morning rolled around, the pancake house shut down and the jazz club opened and stayed open until six in the morning. Four hours while every other club was shutting down and people were heading home, this one was open with some of the best performers, singers, and musicians playing for the pure art and love of performing because none of them were being paid.
The owner, who was nicknamed "Slim Jim", chose who could come into the club and who couldn't, given the one dollar admission fee. It could only hold so many people and with such a cheap fee, a lot of people wanted in. It was also a club that if you knew it, you knew it, and if you didn't…There was no advertisement. It got promoted by word of mouth and the stuff of legends, such as the only meeting between Louis Armstrong and Charlie Parker ever.
That was before he knew about the house. Since it was only one in the morning, the pancake house was still open and he saw several customers through the pane glass windows who were sitting at tables eating a very early morning, after drinking all night, breakfast.
As he neared, he heard music coming from inside the pancake house. "Cold, Cold Feeling" by T-Bone Walker.
~"You treat me like a prisoner, because my hands are tied. Everything you do to me, is stackin' up inside. It's a cold, cold feelin', it's just like ice around my heart. I know I'm gonna quit somebody, every time that feeling start…"~
The stairs led up to a door that he headed towards and walked right in without knocking. The door entered into a hallway and he could smell the aroma from the pancake house below. A room was to his left and further down the hallway on the left was another room. They were numbered 1 and 2.
The hallway opened up into a communal kitchen. There were stairs off the kitchen that went up to the second floor. He went up the stairs, passed room number 3, a communal bathroom, and to the room at the end of the hall. Room number 4. All the rooms were for rent in the house, but only short-term. Relatives visiting family, people new to the city and had yet to get a job and a place of their own, newly released felons who needed a place to stay until they could go somewhere else. Or, in Thomas Harcourt's case, a key witness to a highly publicized trial.
The owner of the house wasn't "Slim Jim", but he'd been surprised to discover that it was, in fact, Ray Langston. He learned that Langston owned a few houses in the district and rented them out or leased them for businesses. All who stayed had their own key to their rooms that could be locked. The door was locked. Knocking on the door, he waited but heard no response.
Looking at Warrick, he saw him shake his head slightly. "No one's home."
"If I had Sara with me, she could pick the lock."
Warrick eyed the door and moved him back as he said, "Move aside. I might not know how to pick a lock, but I know how to open a locked door." He then looked over the door before bringing his leg up and kicking it open. Gesturing toward the open door, he said, "After you."
He walked into the room and stopped as he saw the body. The man he could only assume was Thomas Harcourt was dead on the bed, gunshot wound to the chest. Through the aroma of the pancakes house, he smelt the hint of blood and the foul odor of the dead body.
"Is that your guy?"
Stepping closer, he saw the face of the dead man as he remembered it to be that of Thomas Harcourt. Looking around the room , he told Warrick, "Stay here. It's a crime scene," before he looked at the floor and walked in. "I don't want you to disturb it."
"Oh, and you get to disturb it all you want?"
"I sometimes work crime scenes for the PD. I know how not to disturb it."
The floors were hardwood and from the way Harcourt was lying on the bed, he'd been shot while standing in front of it. From the gunshot wound, the small hole in the front of the shirt and no hole or blood on the wall behind him, meaning no exit, the shooter was standing quite a distance away, possibly at the door. They most likely had already disturbed the shoe prints at the door. There was no bullet casing on the floor and there wasn't much furniture to hide it. The shooter must have known to pick it up. A professional? A cop? It was someone who knew it was evidence and to not leave it.
There was a wallet and small notebook on the table by the bed that was open with part of a sheet of paper torn off. Using his switchblade to open the wallet, he flipped it open and saw the ID. Thomas Harcourt, age 22, address was 1984 Ellis Street. That wasn't too far from where they were now. Only a few blocks over. There wasn't much else in the wallet, only some cash and a picture of him and a young girl. Girlfriend, probably. Slipping the picture into his pocket, he stepped back out of the room and Warrick followed him back down the hallway to the steps.
"I think I saw a phone in the kitchen." As he got to the kitchen, he grabbed the phone that was on the wall as he heard a noise down the hallway.
Looking around the corner of the wall toward the front door, he saw the police already outside. Hanging the phone up, he glanced at Warrick as two officers and a man in a suit and tie headed their way.
"Arrest them," he heard the man in the suit and tie yell out as he held up his hands.
Warrick glared at the cops as he held up his hands as well before they were jerked behind his back. "What'd I do?"
The man in suit and tie had red hair cut short and blue eyes that were piercing as he looked at Warrick and said, "I ask the questions." He was obviously a detective.
"Why are we being arrested?" he asked the detective as an officer pulled his arms down to handcuff him.
"We got a dead body up here," called down one of the police officers who had gone up the steps. "Shot once in the chest. They have a gun?"
The detective pulled open his jacket and saw his gun. "Check him," he said to the officer who had handcuffed Warrick.
"Don't forget to check the wallet," he told the detective as he took his gun. "I have a permit for that, Detective…? Who are you?"
"I'm the man arresting you for murder," the detective said as he grabbed him by the shoulder and shoved him toward the hallway.
The detective followed him as he led him down the hallway and out the front door. Once he was down the steps and being taken to the cop car, he called out to the detective, "We didn't kill him."
"Yeah? We got a call about shots fired at this address," the detective said as he turned him around and pushed him up against the police car. Reaching into this jacket, he pulled out his wallet. Flipping it open, he saw his ID, his P.I. license, and in a slot was his gun permit. "So, you're Grissom. I heard about you. Private Dick, huh?"
"Look, Detective," he said, trying not to sound too annoyed. "We both know how rigor mortis works. I used to be assistant coroner to Doc Robbins. The first four to six hours after death, rigor starts to set in with the eyelids, neck, and jaw. Over the next six hours, it spreads to all other muscles including the internal organs. Full body rigor peaks at 12 hours, fades by 48 hours. That body is in full rigor. That puts the time of death at least 12 hours ago, give or take. The blood is dried and brown in color, which also indicates the time of death hours ago. We couldn't have possibly killed him."
The detective smiled as he pointed at him and said, "Let's see, twelve hours ago would place you here. That was the last you saw him before now, wasn't it?"
"Who are you?" he asked him again.
"I'm Detective Shaw."
Giving a nod, he asked, "Detective Shaw, how did you know I saw Mr. Harcourt yesterday?"
Shaw immediately stilled as his cocky grin dropped as his face turned stern. He realized his mistake, and then made another by saying, "He told me."
"So, by your theory, I talked to Mr. Harcourt yesterday, killed him...and," Sounding as confused, asked, "then a dead man told you that I talked to him?" He heard Warrick laugh next to him as he eyed the detective. "Now, from where I'm standing, you were the last one to talk to Mr. Harcourt before he was killed."
Shaw worked his jaw and looked at the other cops, saying, "Take them in."
"On what grounds?" he asked Detective Shaw in disbelief. "This is a bogus arrest and you know it. There are fireworks going on all over the place. I bet there are hundreds of reports of shots fired. And for you to get here so quickly means that you were sitting on this house, waiting—"
"What're you saying?" Shaw asked as he stepped up to him.
"I'm saying you thought that I was the one who killed him twelve hours ago, so you've been staking it out waiting to see if I'd come back. But, like I said, if Mr. Harcourt called you or talked to you after I left him, then he was alive. You want to run ballistics and check the bullets from my gun to the one in his chest, go right ahead, waste your time—"
"Grissom. Shaw."
He heard the voice and looked over. Homicide Detective O'Riley was walking around the cop cars. The detective's eyes were on him before he looked at Detective Shaw and asked, "What's going on here? Shaw, why'd you got Grissom in handcuffs?"
"Suspicion of murder," Shaw said as he kept staring at him. "And I'm confident his friend here is high." He gave a look to Warrick and said, "I can smell it on him."
"Hey," Warrick said, "you can search me. I've got nothing to hide. And you can't arrest someone for having a smell."
Shaw was the worst kind of cop there was: arrogant, stubborn, and refused to admit when he was wrong. He shook his head at him and said, "This won't get any further than this and you know it."
"Our witness is dead," Shaw snapped. "You were the last one to talk to him—"
"I didn't kill him. Why would I? I have no motive. I wanted him as much alive as anyone else. And Warrick wasn't even with me then. You can let him go."
"He told you where it was, didn't he?" Shaw asked him and that was when he realized the real reason that Shaw staked out the house and had been waiting for him. He only wanted the camera.
Either Judge Cohen let Detective Shaw know that the talked to Mr. Harcourt or Mr. Harcourt actually did call Shaw after he and Sara left him yesterday. Right then he didn't know which it was, or it could have been both. It didn't matter. He didn't trust the detective. "Any evidence I obtain will be delivered to the proper—"
"Cut the bullshit, Grissom—"
"Why don't we all calm down here," O'Riley said as he held up his hands. "Officers, release them both."
Shaw glared at O'Riley and they exchanged a look. Shaw couldn't believe it but he finally stepped away from him and gave a nod to the officers. He was turned around and the handcuffs came off. Warrick was released as well and he looked ready to hit Shaw but stepped away instead. Smart man.
"Are we done here?" he asked as he held out his hand. He wanted his gun and wallet back. Shaw's face twitched, his jaw clenched so tight he was afraid he'd crack his teeth as he handed back his wallet first and then his gun. Holstering his gun, he told him, "Ballistics for my gun are already on file with the PD. Once the lab has the bullet that killed Harcourt, they can check it and it'll tell you what I've been telling you, it's not a match. Though, maybe I should tell them to check it against yours."
Shaw stepped up to him as he told him, "In case you don't know, I'm the arresting officer of Alex Hardy. I'm also the reason why Harcourt went to Langston for help. I was trying to protect him so that he could testify. Now he's dead and without the evidence he had, Alex Hardy will walk. And if you have it, that's obstruction—"
"I know what obstruction is," he told him. "I also know that I'm allowed to examine all evidence to ensure authenticity before handing it over to the proper authorities. And the proper authority in this case would be Ray Langston. Not you."
"You have no idea the mess you're in, do you?" Shaw said before shaking his head at him. "This isn't anything for you to deal with, Grissom. It's only going to get you killed like everyone else that's come in contact with it. Just hand it over and walk away."
Maybe Shaw was right, but he was never one to be intimidated. And his only other priority besides finding Allison Murphy was protecting Sara's life, as well as his own. But, this was never a cushy job without the risk of death. He knew that better than anyone. Sara also understood that and accepted the risk right along with him. And as long as he had a job to do, he'd do it and see it through to the end.
There was also something else he noticed; Shaw never once called it a camera. He only referred to it as "It". So, either he didn't know what it was or he didn't want to tip off to him what it was in case he hadn't found it yet. That was like the mystery man calling the camera a "device".
Sticking with not referring to it as a camera, he told Shaw, "If I have it, you'd know it when Ray Langston presents it at trial, and not a moment before." He glanced at Warrick and motioned for him to follow him as he turned to leave.
Walking up to O'Riley, he thanked him before asking, "Is Brass at the station?"
"He's at the docks, working a case."
"Thanks," he said as he continued on by O'Riley as he headed to his car where Warrick was waiting.
Once in the car, he let out a breath as he started the car and looked over at Warrick. "Have enough excitement for one night?"
Warrick huffed out a laugh and said, "You kidding? We're just getting started. Where to next?"
"Mr. Harcourt's house." Pulling away from the curb, he made a couple left turns and headed toward Harcourts house. "If no one's home, I'm going to need you to kick in the door." He heard Warrick laugh and felt himself smile a little. So far, he was glad Warrick decided to come along. It was nice having someone watching his back.
In the private investigation world, most Private Investigators needed associates or informants to help them do their job. He couldn't be everywhere at once. That was where Sara came in. She could shadow someone or go conduct interviews or keep an eye on a witness or person of interest in a case when he couldn't due to doing something else for the case. He had several informants around the city who he could rely on for information when it was needed. He also had previous clients that he'd helped in the past who were always available to offer up anything they knew if another case happened to bring them back into contact with one another.
He was always looking for people who could be trusted to hire to work for him, and so far, Warrick was proving to be someone who he could trust. Getting to the address, he parked a block down the street and started walking back toward the house.
"Why'd you always park so far away?" Warrick asked once they were walking down the tree lined street with a mixture of Victorian and Italianate houses.
"Several reasons. One is so that my car can't be identified by anyone in the area. Another is that when I'm walking, I can get a better feel of the street. Any escape routes in case someone decides to run instead of answering a few questions. Or, spotting any people in the area…what they're doing, saying…Like I said, there are many different reasons."
Right then, that section of the neighborhood was quiet. Eerily so. In the distance all around him were fireworks and celebrations still happening despite the late hour, but on that street the celebration had ended hours ago. Lights were out in most of the homes except for a light in the front window on the left that he was approaching.
The house was very much like his house with a garage off the sidewalk and steps leading up to a small porch and front door. Knocking, he heard music playing inside and then nothing. It wasn't the music that was turned off; it was his hearing. Everything left him as he looked back at Warrick whose lips were moving but he couldn't hear what he was saying. It was muffled in the fog.
Reading his lips, he made out, "...fighting—" before Warrick pushed him aside and kicked in the door.
He saw a man in the hallway directly in front of him with a gun. Jerking out of the way, he heard the muffled blast of a gun being fired twice before he pulled his gun and saw the man running down the hallway towards the back of the house. He started after him despite the rush of fear that pulsed through his body.
In the front room he passed, he saw a young girl, the same girl in the picture he'd taken from Harcourt's wallet and told Warrick, "Stay with her," as he continued down the hallway.
Entering the kitchen, he saw the door off the kitchen to the right was open. Going over to it, he peered around the wall and saw the man before he saw him raise the gun. Another two shots rang out, shattering the glass in the door along with his ears as everything came rushing back in startling sharp clarity. The glass, the gun blasts, and the scream from the woman down the hallway mixing with the sounds of Charles Mingus's band performing "Moanin'".
He heard running and turned and followed. Going down the hall that led to the backdoor, he saw the man running down the steps to the backyard but he didn't race across the yard to the back for an exit, but instead pulled open the door to the garage and went inside. He followed and as he got to the back door that led into the garage, he peered around the corner into darkness before jerking away as he expected gun fire.
One more shot rang out and splintered the wood next to him as he covered his ears and ducked out of the way. That was five shots and unless he had something other than a revolver, he had one more bullet left before he had to reload. When no other shot rang out, he took a chance and turned and ducked into the darkness of the garage as he heard the overhead garage door start to open. As the door lifted up from the ground and he saw the light from the street light glowing under the door, lighting up the concrete slab and driveway, he saw the shadow of the man.
Taking aim, he felt the wall by the back door and found the light switch.
The light turned on and the man stilled with one hand holding a revolver and the other holding his reload cylinder holding six more bullets. The man was Asian, nearly as tall as he was, with his pinkie finger missing on his left hand.
Shaking his head, he told him, "Please don't do that. I really don't want to shoot you. In fact, I hate guns. I honestly don't like carrying one, but…situations like this are the reasons why I have to." Stepping closer to him, and never wavering on his aim, he told him, "Drop the gun."
The garage door was nearly open enough to where the man could run out, but there was someone blocking his path as Warrick walked around the corner. He grabbed the man's left arm and twisted it back, preventing him from reloading his gun and from running. Turning him towards him, he let him go before drawing back and then punching the man in the face. The man's knees buckled and he collapsed to the concrete slab on the floor.
Looking up from the man he'd knocked out, Warrick told him, "I also learned how to box in the Navy. They didn't call me the "K.O. Kid" for nothing."
He holstered his gun as he looked down at the man who was out cold on the floor. "Good going. Can you tie him up and I'll be down to talk to him after I talk to the girl."
Warrick gave a nod as he looked around for something to tie him up with as he walked by them and headed back up to the house. There were no sirens in the distance that he could hear and he saw no lights on in the buildings around them on the street. Shots being fired on the Fourth of July wasn't anything abnormal enough in the area or the fireworks that were exploding in the distance was enough to mask the shots. Either way, as far as he could tell, there would be no cops arriving on scene anytime soon.
Walking back into the house, the music was off and the girl was pacing the floor in the front room that was the living room. There was a couch, coffee table, and the radio and not much else in the room. Removing his hat, he introduced himself, "Miss, I'm Gil Grissom. A private detective. I—uh…Who was that man?"
She finally stopped pacing and looked up at him and he saw her face. She had lacerations on her face and bruising. Her hands were shaking; he immediately stepped over to her and took her hand in his, squeezing slightly as he told her, "You don't have to worry about him. My friend's watching him, he's not going to hurt you anymore."
Leading her to the couch, he sat on the coffee table and eased her down until she sat in front of him on the couch. Placing his hat down, he took her other hand in his and smiled slightly as he looked her face over. "You're lucky, you shouldn't need stitches. Do you have any band-aids?"
"Cabinet in the bathroom."
He gave a nod and stood as he let go of her hands and headed down the hallway. The bathroom was on the right before the kitchen. He found the band-aids and also wetted a cloth and took it back to her in the living room. He used the cloth to clean the blood off her face and then covered the small lacerations with the band-aids. She needed one for the cut over her left eye and on her cheek.
Her bottom lip was also busted and she used the cloth to press against her lips. "Thank you."
Shaking his head, he told her, "Wished I had gotten here sooner. Who is he?"
"Warrick said I could trust you," she said as she looked him over. "That you his friend." She took a breath and then said, "I don' know who that man is. He was askin' 'bout my boyfriend. He wanted ta know where somethin' was hidden. I don' know what he was talkin' 'bout." He gave a nod as he took out the picture he'd taken out of Harcourt's wallet and handed it to her. She grabbed it out of his hand in shock as she asked, "Where you get this?"
From her accent, he knew she was from the South. Georgia or Louisiana perhaps. Looking at her face, he told her, "From your boyfriend's wallet. Miss…I'm sorry to tell you this, but…Thomas was killed."
He would never get used to telling someone that someone that they loved was dead. It hurt everything in his body as he felt what they felt. Remembering for himself the pain that ripped his body apart and made him feel as if he himself were dying. And in a way, he had died. The day his family was killed, something inside of him had also been killed, and in a lot of ways he'd stopped living.
The young girl in front of him was dying in front of him as she cried and held onto the picture of her and her boyfriend tightly in her hand. Saying "I'm sorry for your loss" was never enough. It wasn't enough. He didn't tell her that he would find out who had killed him. And he hoped that that knowledge would bring closure for her as much as he hoped that knowledge would bring closure for him.
Once she had settled down, he asked her, "Do you have somewhere else you can go?"
She wiped her eyes and gave a nod. "My sista's house."
"I can call a cab for you." He stood and looked around for the phone.
"It's in tha kitchen," she told him.
Going into the kitchen, he found the phone on the wall and dialed the operator and asked to connect to the taxi service that serviced the Fillmore District. Once he got a cab dispatched to the address, he looked around the place. He didn't find anything in the kitchen, and the bedroom was upstairs.
"You should pack a bag," he told her as he walked back into the living room and held out his hand for her. "I'll help you."
Leading her up the steps to the bedroom, he walked into the room and watched for a moment as she packed a suitcase with the clothes and personal items she had there. Then he looked around the room. There wasn't much furniture, just a bed, a chair with clothes hanging on it, and a closet.
"When was the last time you saw Thomas?" he asked her.
"Last I saw Tom was before he was hidden away by Mista Langston."
Glancing up to the top shelf of the closet, he spotted a metal box. "Where are you from, originally?"
"Lake Charles, Louisiana."
"Thomas from there too?" he asked as he walked over to the closet and pulled down the metal box.
"We met in school. Came up together with my family. His family's still in Louisiana. You not goin' find it here."
He glanced at the girl and smirked slightly. He knew that because he already had the camera. "I know. I'm not looking for what that man was looking for." Using his thumb, he moved the metal latch aside and lifted the lid of the box. Inside was a gun, some cash, and an envelope. Taking the cash out, he handed it over to her.
She frowned as she took it and then looked into the box. The frown deepened.
"I take it you didn't know what he did for a living."
"I know what he did; he was ah bartender at nightclubs."
"What nightclubs?"
"Tha Mockin' Jay and some palace. Madame's Palace."
He pocketed the gun from the box into his inside jacket pocket and the envelope he kept in his hand as he put the box back where he'd gotten it. "Where were you yesterday and today?"
"Work and my sista's house. I been stayin' with her evah since Tom, but today I missed him so I came home. My sista had ah Fourth of July party at her house; I didn't stay."
"And was the man already here when you got home?"
She gave a nod. "He was waitin' inna kitchen."
Opening the envelope, he pulled out a folded sheet of paper and some photographs. They were of him and the young girl. Turning the photos over, he saw he'd written their names and the year the photos were taken. Her name was Cassidy. The letter was addressed to his family in Louisiana.
Putting everything back inside the envelope, he handed it to her to keep or to send to his family. She stuffed it into her suitcase and shut it. Walking with her out of the room, they went back down to the living room just as the taxi pulled up to the curb. He grabbed his hat and walked with her out of the house and down the steps. He got the door to the taxi for her. Pulling out his wallet, he handed some money to the driver.
Going to the window, he asked Cassidy, "Is there a phone number I can reach you?"
She gave him the number to her sister's house and he handed over his business card. Taking his card, she looked up at him and said, "Thank you, Mista Grissom."
"You're welcome, Cassidy." He stepped back and gave a nod as he couldn't think of anything else to say.
He watched the taxi as it got to the corner and then took a right turn around the corner. The garage door was down so he walked back up to the house. He shut and locked the front door, turned off the lights, and went out the backdoor but left it unlocked so he could get back in to call the police. He went back down the backstairs and into the garage. Once inside, he shut the door and locked it.
The man was sitting on the ground and tied up to a wooden post. Warrick, who was standing in front of the man, tossed him a wallet once he got close enough. Looking at the ID, he saw that the man's name was Zhao Ze Jing. Knowing that the family name was first and then the given name, he said, "Well, Mr. Zhao, looks like you're not going anywhere for a while. So, you can answer my questions and I can call the police to come get you. Or, you can remain silent, and I'll still call the police to come get you."
He flipped through the wallet and beside money, both dollars and renminbi, otherwise known as "yuan", he spotted a torn piece of notebook paper with the address written on it. Someone had given him Harcourt's home address. He had many things in his suit pockets from business cards to his switchblade to a pair of tweezers that he took out in order to remove the piece of paper from the wallet. He tossed the wallet back to Zhao. It hit him in the chest since he couldn't do anything about catching it and it landed in his lap.
Zhao glared up at him and stayed silent.
"He hasn't spoken a word," Warrick told him.
Getting frustrated, he glared at Zhao as he told him, "I'm not a violent man, Mr. Zhao, but I hate dead ends and uncooperative suspects. I like to keep moving forward. And right now, I have three dead bodies, a missing woman, a concerned husband, a girl that you tried to beat information out of, and a whole lot of unanswered questions. But the two questions I want the answer to the most is where is Allison Murphy and who do you work for. Now, you can sit there and not say anything, and…I can also let my friend here do to your face worse than what you did to Cassidy's before you're arrested for battery and murder. And since we have your gun, and soon so will the police, they can run ballistics and see whether or not you're the one who shot and killed Thomas Harcourt yesterday…after he'd given you his home address."
Nervousness was contagious like a virus as he saw the sweat form on Zhao's forehead as his rapid eyes looked from him, to Warrick, and back to him and worked his jaw but remained silent.
"As for who you work for…I have a good idea it's the man from China that I played poker with Sunday afternoon: Li Yat-sen."
Zhao's eyes widened slightly before he started blinking rapidly as he breathing and heart rate quickened. He could tell that by the pulsing vein in his neck and how his chest started to rise and fall before he let out a deep breath trying to calm himself down. The body gave away so many clues that sometimes it didn't matter where or not someone talked; he got his answers.
"How'd you think he'd react when he learns you've been arrested?"
Zhao paled slightly as he shook his head but kept his eyes forward and didn't say anything.
"He's not going to talk," Warrick said. "Even if I get a good whack at him he won't say anything."
Smirking slightly, he told Warrick, "He's been talking this whole time. Didn't you hear him? He's working for Li Yat-sen and he killed Thomas Harcourt. The crime lab can verify that with his gun and bullets. And," he held up the tweezers with the torn piece of paper that had the address written down on it as he said, "this piece of paper was torn from the notebook that was next to Harcourt's wallet on the table by the bed where he was found dead. Shot once." He smiled at Zhao as he told him, "You fired five rounds and had to reload…meaning, you were short one round, because you had already fired it into Harcourt's chest yesterday."
Warrick whistled and muttered, "Damn, you're good."
Zhao had gone still as he kept his eyes on the floor.
"Something you should know about paper, Mr. Zhao, is that it can hold a fingerprint for years. How much are you willing to bet that not only does this piece of paper have Harcourt's fingerprints on it, but your own? Now, you might be asking yourself why help me when I got you for murder? You help me, you'll also be helping the SFPD, and the D.A. all at the same time, and maybe the D.A. will cut you a break and instead of the death penalty, it'd been life with possible parole." When Zhao still remained silent, he let out a breath as he told Warrick, "Watch him, I'm going to call the police."
As he went to walk out of the garage, Zhao called out, "We don't have Murphy's wife."
He stopped and looked back at Zhao. "Who has her?"
He shook his head. He didn't know.
Leaving the garage, he went up to the house and grabbed the phone to call the police. Sitting down in the chair at the table, he didn't dial 9-1-1 but instead the station's dispatch number directly and asked to be patched through to Detective Jim Brass's car.
He wasn't going to take any chances. He wanted someone out here he could trust. And Detective Shaw wasn't someone he could trust. Even though it was Shaw's case, or O'Riley's, he wanted to hand everything off to Brass first that way he knew it was with a detective he could trust.
The voice that came over the line wasn't Brass, but that of a Texas draw. It was Officer Stokes. "This is Officer Stokes—"
"Officer, why are you answering Brass's radio?" he asked.
"He's busy and told me to take the call. What'cha got, Grissom?"
He told him that he had a suspect in the murder of Thomas Harcourt and gave him the address. "I want Brass out here, not anyone else."
"All right, I'll let him know," Stokes told him before the call was disconnected.
He hung up the phone and looked around the kitchen. He grabbed a glass and filled it with water and downed it before refilling it and taking it down to the garage for Warrick.
Half an hour later, he was sitting on the steps to Harcourt's house when Brass's car pulled up. Inside it were both Brass and Officer Stokes. Standing, he shook both of their hands and then tapped on the garage door. The door lifted up to reveal both Warrick and Zhao, who was still tied to the post.
"Detective Brass, Officer Stokes, this is Warrick Brown, he's been helping me tonight," he said as he introduced them. "And that's Ze Jing Zhao."
As he handed over all the evidence, the guns, both Zhao's and the one he'd found in Harcourt's closet, the reload cylinder with the bullets, Zhao's wallet and the torn piece of paper, he told Brass everything that had happened that night. The only thing he left out was that Zhao was working for Li Yat-sen. He didn't want Brass and the Vice cops after Yat-sen yet. He wanted time to work his own case a little more before he got them onto him.
Right then, they had Zhao for Harcourt's murder with all the evidence they needed. They could try to get him to spill everything else on their own.
Brass and Stokes inventoried all the evidence and once they were done, he gestured for Brass to step aside as he left Warrick and Nick so that they could talk on their own. He stopped near the front steps to the house and waited for Brass to join him before asking, "What's going on?"
He didn't have to elaborate for Brass to know what he was asking about. "So, we've been trying to track down those dock workers that Sara said killed Stanley Alder and kidnapped her. Well, we finally caught a break when two dock workers went missing today only to show up dead. That's where we were when you called. And, uh, so far nothing about who else they worked for and no sign or talk of Allison Murphy."
"How'd they die?"
Brass sighed heavily, saying, "First blush, both look like accidents but…come on. I wasn't born yesterday."
"Yeah," he said, shaking his head. There were no accidents. They were murdered. "What were their names? The dock workers?"
"Uh, Matthew Poe and Larry Dukay."
He stared over at Brass as the second name hit him like a gut punch to the chest. All the air escaped his lungs as he breathed out slowly as he was taken back ten years. The memory of Susan Dukay, her dead body in her kitchen after being raped and strangled, had been the same day he'd learned he was going to be a father. That case was still unsolved. "Larry Dukay? As in Susan Dukay's husband?"
"You remember that too." Brass had been the lead detective on the case. "That got me wondering—"
"If there's a connection? It's been ten years. That's a long time, but…also, just yesterday. As Albert Einstein once said, "Time is not at all what it seems. It doesn't flow in only one direction, and the future exists simultaneously with the past." Or, in this case, the present exists simultaneously with the past."
Brass was eyeing him oddly before shrugging, saying, "That's like my motto. Once a crime is committed, it's never forgotten. It has—" His voice faded away into a muffle fog and his eyes dropped to Brass's lips as he caught the last of what he was saying, "...I don't believe in cold cases. There's always something. Maybe with this, I'll find something that will help me finally close that Dukay case."
He gave a nod and went to step away, saying, "I hope you find it."
Warrick and Nick were talking and laughing about something, but he couldn't really hear it as he frowned at the worsening of his deafness. It was becoming more frequent within the last year. He was one month shy of his thirty-ninth birthday and he had a feeling that by the time he reached forty he'd be lucky to hear much of anything.
"You coming, Warrick?"
He read Warrick's lips as he told him, "Yeah, be right there," before he shook Nick's hand. He gave a nod to Brass before walking with him down the street to the car.
It'd been a pretty eventful night and at least one thing was cleared up: the murder of Thomas Harcourt. He had some more leads to follow up on after he got some sleep. All the festivities had all died down as he checked his watch and saw it was after three in the morning.
He realized he hadn't eaten all day. He was starving. "Are you hungry?"
"I could eat. I can cook us breakfast back at the club. You can pay me by playing another song. Nothing's free."
He smiled as he pulled out his keys as they approached his car. "You're on."
Over an hour later, as dawn was whispering at the horizon to the east, he sat at the piano while Warrick was in the club's kitchen cooking them breakfast. The club was closed but Lillie Ivers and a few workers and band members were lingering around, sitting at the tables, drinking and laughing.
As he started playing "My Funny Valentine" a man walked up onto the stage and picked up the trumpet and together the two of them played. He figured before he stopped being able to hear himself play that he might as well hear what he sounded like playing with a trumpet player. It sounded good to his ears, until he stopped being able to hear it. He tried to just play, knowing what keys he had to stroke but without hearing the trumpet, it made it impossible to know if he was improving and what to play off of, so he stopped. He leaned on the piano and just watched the man play.
Then once the sound of the trumpet came back to him, he smiled at him and went back to finishing the song to the delight of the other people in the room who'd listened.
"Breakfast is done," Warrick called out to everyone as it wasn't just him who he'd cooked for.
The trumpet player shook his hand once he stood up from the piano bench and said, "That was alright."
He felt himself smile as he said, "It was, wasn't it?"
"Name's Reggie."
"Gil."
"You can play with me anytime, Gil," he said as they walked over to the counter to get the breakfast plates that Warrick had prepared for them.
He finally left the club once the dawn broke and most people were getting up in the morning for work. Driving home, he let himself feel something he hadn't let himself feel in a long time. He felt good; felt like he had a good time, along with doing his job very well.
Parking on the street, he walked up the steps to the front door and slipped inside and shut the door. He hung up his hat, kicked off his shoes, tossed his keys into the marble bowl by the door, pulled off his jacket and tossed it over the arm of the couch as he passed it. Getting to his bedroom, he set the alarm on the clock to go off in three hours before crawling into bed. He closed his eyes as sunlight poured through the window.
Then, the phone rang.
TBC…
Disclaimer songs mentioned: "Midnight at the Mill" by Four Charms. "Cold, Cold Feeling" by T-Bone Walker. "Moanin'" by Charles Mingus. "My Funny Valentine" by Miles Davis.
PS: "Slim's Stacks and Jazz" is based on a real jazz club in the Fillmore District during the 1940s to the 1960s called "Jimbo's Bop City" or just "Bop City". There is a 1998 documentary about the club titled The Legend of Bop City. If I could have lived back then, this would have been the place I would've visited.
