By A.R.Yngve
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I
Detective Innis Garris at Homicide, Precinct 20, had been invited to dinner with Sergeant Bolland's family. After solving a particularly awful drug-related murder case, he needed to get back in touch with normal people. "Would you like the last piece of the cake?" Mrs. Bolland asked at the end of the dinner. "Thanks, but I'll pass," Garris said. "A normal dinner for me consists of boiled vegetables and fried t-bone steak." "You ought to get married again," Mrs. Bolland suggested, and started to describe a suitable single female friend of hers. Garris had not been in a relationship with a woman for a year. He sent Bolland a pleading stare, but the sergeant shrugged and smiled. As they gathered on the couch and Bolland's two sons sat down in front of the TV, the local evening news caught everyone's attention. The big headline was that one of the city's lawyer celebrities had just been murdered - during a live broadcast. Even Bolland, who rarely showed surprise, raised his eyebrows. "According to a phone call from producer Curt Maxim it was here, in BOBC's new studio, during the shooting of the reality hit show 'America's Contenders,' that the contestant, lawyer Jerome Salomonson was found... dead from a knife wound. The police has not yet identified the killer, and the whole studio has been sealed off pending interrogation of the cast and crew." Garris asked, "What was he doing in a reality show?" His cell phone rang, and he picked it up. "It's the station. Captain wants me in the TV studio, now." He paused. "The captain can't come himself, he's at some charity dinner." "That's what the show is about," the older boy explained. "The viewers get to vote a winner among a group of people who want to be Congressmen. The winner gets to be a candidate in the next election." "You're kidding," said Garris. The others gave him strange looks. "Uh, I don't watch reality TV." The broadcast showed images of the TV studio where the murder had occurred: a cluster of barracks one block away from Antonioni University. "Hey, I've seen that building," muttered Bolland. "Sir," he said, falling into his routine jargon, "Did the captain ask me to...?" Garris got out of his armchair and took Mrs. Bolland's hand. "It was so nice of you to invite me, I'd love to come here again. Could you forgive me if I...?" She smiled. "Of course. Ernie has told me how dedicated you are. Good luck, Mr. Garris." "You don't have to come," he said to Bolland, but the sergeant kissed his wife and stood up. "All right... come along. May be a complete waste of time though," he said while getting into his overcoat. "I have a hunch the Feds are going to be all over this case." They left and walked to Bolland's car.
"Do you watch the show?" Garris asked the sergeant. "Fill me in. Who was Jerome Salomonson, and what was he doing in America's Contenders?" "Well... I watch it with the wife, but she's the fan. I prefer Bonanza reruns. Salomonson was a lawyer with a private firm before he joined the show. He did get some publicity a year ago when he won a minor pollution lawsuit against a big corporation. He's too lightweight to get into public office, though. "So he joined America's Contenders because he's got the superficial charm and good looks, but he's not smart or savvy enough to climb the regular career ladder." "I didn't know you were into politics," Garris said, visibly impressed. "I'm just quoting my wife, sir." Bolland's attention wandered to the traffic, and he leaned forward. The evening rush hour had passed, but traffic was lining up and slowing to a crawl. When arriving, there no parking space could be found in the entire area; cars packed the sidewalks and the open lot outside the fenced-in BOBC barracks. A giant signpost at the perimeter announced in letters five feet tall: AMERICA'S CONTENDERS ON BOBC - WHERE YOU CHOOSE TOMORROW'S LEADERS! Next to the slogan were four huge smiling figures. Garris recognized one of them as Jerome Salomonson from TV; he had never met the man in person. Bolland drove into an evergreen shrubbery at the edge of the open field, and pushed the door open. "This used to be where students played football," he said, brushing aside twigs and needles. "The university leased it to commercial interests, and the football team was kicked out and died." They stepped out of the bushes and made their way into the crowded field. Police cars, news crews and TV-station vans encircled the BOBC fence like some latter-day siege. When they finally reached the police line, reporters mobbed Garris; a microphone boom hit the taller Bolland on the head, and he snarled at the crowd to step back. Garris ignored the torrent of shouted questions, and flashed his badge to the three armed cops who guarded the perimeter. He recognized them from the station. "The Feds come here yet?" he asked. "Haven't seen them yet. The media almost beat us to it." One officer pointed to the cell-phone headset he was wearing. "I hear the damn TV show is still on hold. The producers are on the captain's ass now, begging to show the body on air." "Has anyone left the crime scene? Cast, crew, catering, repairmen, janitors?" All three officers shook their heads. "All right, the captain told me to go in first. Don't let anybody out, no matter what their excuse is. I don't care if they're going to have a baby, they'll have it in the building. We'll send for a doctor. Come along, Bolland, and keep your gun ready, there's a killer on the set."
A man wearing a baseball cap and a pair of headphones came pacing toward them, and Bolland reached for his gun; maybe he overreacted, but someone had just been murdered and he wasn't taking any chances. "It's all right! It's all right!" the man shouted, waving his hands as he stopped. "I'm the show's executive producer, Curt Maxim. Are you with the FBI?" Garris flashed his badge. "Detective Garris, Homicide, 20th precinct." Sergeant Bolland looked down at his own tieless shirt and jacket, and seemed to dimly realize that he wasn't in uniform. "Did you seal all exits?" "Yes!" Maxim said. There was a loud, abrasive quality to his speech, as if he had a slight hearing problem. He had a three-day stubble and a pot-belly, and carried a small laptop computer in one hand. "As soon as we found Salomonson dead, we got off the air and locked all the doors. One of the cast tried to run away, but the security guards stopped her." "Who?" Curt Maxim leaned closer and lowered his voice. "One of the competing candidates, Marietta Radkowicz. The guards are keeping an eye on her. If you want to question her now, she's over there in -" "Let's see the crime scene first." Garris pointed to one of the wall cameras. "Are we being taped now?" "Yes," Maxim said. "We're waiting to resume the show as soon as you're done. We were doing the live broadcast segement when it happened. The contestants were going to have a four-way debate..." Garris rubbed his eyes. "Let me get this straight... one of the contestants has just been murdered on the set, and you want to continue a live broadcast?" Curt Maxim urged the two to come along, shouting as he paced ahead. "We can't show taped reruns much longer. Every minute costs! Besides, ratings are going through the roof now! I talked to the other three contestants, and they understand it's for their benefit that the show goes on." "Such wonderful human beings," Bolland deadpanned, but Garris silenced him with an impatient wave of the hand. Garris was extra tense, with the remote-controlled cameras visibly focusing their lenses on him. Somewhere close, in the control room, he imagined technicians following his every move, thinking of making a live broadcast of an ongoing murder investigation. Someone entered, and they turned around to see who had gotten past the perimeter. Three men in dark coats walked in, brandishing their FBI badges simultaneously. "Are you in charge of this scene?" one of them asked Garris. They shook hands. "Willie Mochner, FBI." The agent was short, slim and had a neatly trimmed red beard. The ring on his left ear and the pitch of his voice indicated he might be gay. "Garris, 20th precinct. I just arrived. Did you also hear it on TV first?" "I was watching when the contestants started screaming, and then the broadcast stopped... it's my favorite show, actually. Let's go check the body. Did anyone leave the building?" "Not to my knowledge, no." They followed the producer through the main hallway to a corridor labeled BATHROOMS. A door to a small toilet hung open. "It was a short drive across town to get here, but traffic was a bitch... holy crap!" They formed a half-circle around the doorway. Apparently the victim, Jerome Salomonson, had been caught pants down: he sat slumped down on the open toilet seat, his throat slit; blood had stained his shirt and tie, the floor and his skinny white legs. His pants and underwear had been pulled down around his ankles. Mochner made a sad frown. Garris studied the toilet-door on both sides; the inside surface was splattered with blood, as if someone had tossed a bucketful at it. On the stained tiles beneath the toilet sink, someone had dropped a large long raincoat, a pair of rubber gloves, a pair of fine leather shoes... and the murder weapon, a small but sharp kitchen knife. All items had bloodstains on them. He noted that the toilet door did have the typical lock that could only be used from the inside, and pointed this out to the others. As far as he could see, the lock had not been tampered with. When he tried to shake it, it refused to budge even a millimeter. No screwdriver scratches could be seen on the door surface or the lock. "What do you make of this?" he asked Mochner. Agent Mochner angled his head to the side. He leaned down close to the bloodied door-handle on the door's inside, then looked up at the ceiling. "I'd say... too bad the cameras were never aimed this way. The killer picked one of the few spots in the whole studio that's never on TV. And unless Salomonson forgot to lock the door, he opened from the inside." "And look how the bloodstains are limited to the toilet itself," Garris added. "The carpet is clean. Not a single footprint or stain on it. The killer was stone cold enough to remember removing his or her shoes before he left." From his coat pocket, Mochner picked up what resembled a pen. He pulled it out into a telescopic stick, and poked at the discarded shoes until the size number came into view. "Size ten." "Bolland, call the crime lab and ask them to dust off this place, photograph and collect all that stuff. The coroners can wait a while with moving the body. We might have to arrange a confrontation with the suspects." "Do your people look for ear prints on doors?" asked Mochner. "You're welcome to look at our surveillance tapes," the producer suggested, standing behind them. "We've got hours and hours on tape from a dozen locations in this studio." Mochner produced a cell phone with a camera and took a snapshot of the body. "I'll send this to my office." Sergeant Bolland pinched his nose; he hated smells. "Can I flush, sir?" "No. But I'm not going to search that bowl." The producer wanted to take his own cell-phone photo of the body, but Garris grabbed his arm and forcefully stopped him. "No publicity stills! You want that image passed on to the whole world?" "But he took a photo!" Curt Maxim complained, indicating the FBI agent. "I trust him. You are a murder suspect." "But I want to help you... don't you want to see the tapes?" "What about that woman who tried to escape?" "Marietta Radkowitcz. She was the one who found Salomonson. She came running down the hall, screaming bloody murder, and the guards stopped her when she tried to run through the exit." "Did she have shoes on?" Mochner snapped. "Uh... yes." "Are you sure she was the first one on the crime scene?" Garris nodded toward the nearest wall camera, which was pointed at the entrance to the toilet corridor. "Did the control room check who else came this way before the body was found?" "Have you secured the tapes, so nobody can erase them?" Mochner asked. Garris and Mocher had him scared now. Maxim stuttered: "The video feed is transmitted directly from here to the main office uptown. It's impossible to erase them from here! If anyone tried, the main office would receive a warning message from the computers. This is a state-of-the-art outfit. We've got safeguards against that kind of thing!" Garris didn't know what to believe. But he disliked Curt Maxim already. Bolland was turning pallid from the toilet smell. Garris remembered now, how much they had eaten for dinner. "Tape it up, Bolland," he said, pointing to the toilet doorway. "Then take a break if you want to. We'll go have a look at the suspects. Has anyone else questioned them?" "No. They're waiting in the Forum." Bolland started taping up the toilet, holding his nose.
The centerpiece of the America's Contenders studio set was a large room nicknamed "The Forum." Here the competitors held broadcast public speeches and debates - often before an invited audience. The viewers could then phone in their judgment score by text-message or e-mail. The wall behind the speaker's pulpit was entirely covered by a video wall, composed of large flatscreen monitors. Nowhere in the studio stood any big television cameras of the old-fashioned variety that Garris had expected... all he saw were the many small, wall-mounted and portable ones. "Last week," Mochner said, "a friend of mine, who teaches over at the university, had some of his students come over here to play audience. Salomonson was the top-scoring contestant." "I'm not sure I'm following you," Garris replied. The security guards nodded to the cops, and pointed out the cast and crew: they were all seated on the audience chairs before the empty pulpit. It looked like a presidential press conference but with the main attraction missing; instead of a presidential seal, the pulpit was adorned with the America's Contenders slogan in red, white and blue. "It's perfectly easy. At the end of every episode, the viewers phone in a score of each contestant. The one with the bottom score will drop out of the contest. They are shown not just during their performances, but also backstage. They've visited schools, workplaces, talked to people in the street..." "Just a moment, Mochner." Garris stopped; Mochner and his assistants followed suit. "While we've got the advantage of time, before the media storm the place... let me point out that I'm in a peculiar position here. This is my case; I got here first; this is my precinct. But you've been following this crazy show and know stuff about the contestants and the production that I don't have a clue about." "So do thirty million other viewers," Mochner said with a shrug. "We don't have time for territorial pissing, okay? I'm prepared to give you all the credit for solving the case, if you assist me in my investigation." "Hmm..." Mochner made a pondering face and pinched his chin theatrically. "The FBI playing second fiddle to a cop. But... it's a good offer. I get full credit." "Full credit, you do the arrest, you get shown on TV, get autographs from the contestants, free T-shirt... I don't care. Just help me find the killer fast. It's only a matter of minutes before the contestants and the TV company start sending in their lawyers." "Okay." Mochner's index-finger started darting back and forth between them. "Eeenie, meenie, minie, moe..." Garris frowned; this was an eccentric FBI agent. "...you, are, it. You play the bad cop." Garris urged the producer to come to his side, and took the place behind the pulpit. He looked out at his audience of suspects, scattered among twenty folding-chairs. Three contestants in conservative dark-blue suits sat in front - every one with a head of hair that seemed made of steel wool. One man wore a blue tie. The other man wore a red tie. The woman, Marietta Radkowicz, wore a red, white and blue scarf. None of them looked older than forty. All of them sat tense, coiled up, their sweat invisible behind a layer of pancake make-up. And yet their faces were strangely flat, expressionless. He checked their shoes and socks: no bloodstains. The shoes were identical dark-brown ones, even on the woman. What if she had changed shoes at the last minute after the murder? He turned to the producer and whispered: "Does Marietta always wear men's shoes?" "She can't wear high heels. Says it's an old injury." "Okay." Behind the three "candidates" sat the television crew, six men and women of varying age. They too were tense, but shifted their legs frequently, looked at their watches, were openly impatient. One woman was crying silently. The two security guards, in brown uniforms, stood by the exits. Garris had seen bizarre crimes in this city before - but this was unknown territory. There was too much evidence to consider: millions of TV-watching character witnesses, hundreds of hours of video footage. In a world where everyone could see almost everything of other people - where any moron could capture an ongoing crime with a simple cell-phone camera and broadcast it to the world... who needed cops? For the first time in his career, Garris worried that he wasn't needed anymore. He cleared his throat. Bad cop it is... "I'm Detective Innis Garris at Homicide, 20th precinct. I don't care if you're famous. I don't give a damn whether any one of you is going to be a Congressman one day, or win this damn contest. All I care about is to catch the person - or persons - who murdered Jerome Salomonson. And when I look at this bunch of wannabe celebrities, I see at least three people with a shared motive: ambition. Maybe several ones worked together to eliminate a competing candidate; maybe one of you did it alone. It doesn't matter. You will be found out tonight." He paused and let the threat sink in. All three candidates immediately began to voice outraged objections; not one of them seemed the least bit hesitant, or beset by guilt. Garris watched the crew. They were all tense, but no one more so than the others. Curt Maxim was quiet, and typed a text-message on his phone. Garris asked Mochner, in a lowered voice, "Did anyone on the set have an affair with anyone else?" Mochner said, "The rumor is that Ray Johnstone, the candidate with the red tie, is sleeping with one of the female members of the crew. He's unmarried, and so is Marietta Radkowicz. Alex Hobsend, the one with the blue tie, is married and nobody sleeps with him, including his wife. That's the gossip, anyway." "Where did you find out all this?" "It's on the fan message boards. There are leaks from BOBC insiders, too." "So what parties do they belong to?" "That's not decided yet." "And Salomonson? Did he ever antagonize a member of the crew? Did he sleep with anyone? Was he married or not?" "Not that I know of. He was the most popular with the viewers. And unmarried." "Please keep the viewers out of this. I've got enough suspects as it is. He turned to the audience again. "Salomonson was found dead in the toilet; his throat had been slit. The killer left behind a large long raincoat, a pair of rubber gloves, a pair of size ten fine leather shoes, and a bloody knife. I want you to try and remember, if any one of those items have gone missing today, or whether you saw someone bring them into the studio. It seems the victim had unlocked the toilet from ins..." Garris froze. He'd been conned! "No, wait. The largest bloodstains were on the inside of the door. Which means..." Mochner added: "The toilet door was closed when the killer slit Jerome's throat... and was standing behind him. The blood spurted from the severed artery, directly against the door." Garris almost forgot that he had an audience. "Maybe the killer was hiding in there in advance, and waited until Jerome went to the bathroom. It's a small room, so the killer would have to squeeze into a corner... no, that wouldn't work. How could the killer possibly know when Jerome needed to visit the bathroom?" "I've already thought of that, you know." "So what were the killer and Salomonson doing in the toilet together?" Mochner smiled: "Engaging in some off-camera kinkiness? I noted that the toilet had been used." For a Fed, Garris thought, the man had a tasteless sense of humor. "When a person dies, it happens he craps himself involuntarily. The killer cold have pulled the victim's pants down after he died, to make it look like Jerome was using the john. In any case, the killing itself must have happened inside the toilet, with a closed door, with the killer standing behind or next to the victim." Mochner shook his head. "Why would the killer go through all that trouble, and risk, to make it look like the victim was using the toilet?" "Don't think alibi, think psychology," said Garris. "The killer wasn't satisfied with merely murdering Salomonson, he or she wanted him to be publicly humiliated in death. Think about that picture you took... if it were spread to the public." "So the killer's driving motive was emotion rather than calculation," Mochner said. "Hatred, or jealousy, or a combination of both. Unless, of course, you buy the kinky angle." Garris frowned and turned to Sergeant Bolland, who shrugged back, as if to express that his wife had no further insider information. He addressed the suspects again. "Everyone who wears size ten shoes, raise your hand!" He turned his head in Curt Maxim's direction. "That includes you." Maxim raised his right hand - as did Marietta Radkowicz, Ray Johnstone, Alex Hobsend, and one male member of the studio crew. "That's Rick Stein," Maxim explained. "He's been working with us for years. Keeps to himself, but he does his job." "What's Rick's Stein's relationship with the victim?" asked Garris. Maxim reacted with an incredulous laugh. "Relationship? I don't know!" Then: "He's quite a fan himself. Always asks people who star in the show for autographs and signed photos." "All right... sergeant, go get those bloody shoes from the toilet." "But I taped up the doorway. I can't reach inside." "Borrow Mochner's telescopic stick." "I'll trust you with my magic stick, sergeant," Mochner said, smiling at Bolland in a rather dubious way. "Be gentle with it." He gave the pen-shaped gadget to the sergeant - who marched off into the corridor, blushing red in the face. "Try to be serious, Mochner. We're short on time." "Okay, okay." "Now," he told the audience, "I want every one of you to line up around me and walk in a big circle until I tell you to stop. You too, Maxim. And the security guards. Mochner, you let your men guard the exits in case anyone tries to escape. Come on! This is not a joke, people. Line up in a circle now." The six crewmembers, the three competitors, the producer and the two security guards made a circle, facing front, and started walking around, slowly at first. "More speed," Garris said, gesturing to them from the pulpit as if he were conducting an orchestra. "No dragging. Come on, you can do faster than that!" In a lower voice, he told Mochner: "Watch for the one who limps or trips." He clapped his hands. "Faster!" The circle broke into a near run; suddenly, Marietta Radkowicz tripped and fell. "Stop!" Garris came down to her and helped her up. She glared at him with cold, hateful eyes. "Excuse me. Please take off your shoes." "This is not funny!" she told him. "If you think you can..." "I can. Now please give me your shoes or I'll have you arrested and brought outside in handcuffs, with all the media watching." She went pale and swiftly removed her shoes, then gave them to Garris. He noted that her white socks had no bloodstains on them. The shoes were clean. But they were size twelve. Her feet were obviously too small for them. "You raised your hand. What is your actual foot size?" "N... nine. I have an old tendon injury in my feet, I can't wear shoes unless they're flat and one size larger. Ask my doctor if you don't believe me." "Are these your shoes?" He held up the size twelves. "No. I borrowed them from the cloakroom today." "Where are your own shoes, then?" "I couldn't find them! I left them outside my room this morning when I took a rest, and when I woke up they were gone!" Bolland returned with the bloodied leather shoes in a transparent plastic bag. A good policeman, he always carried evidence bags with him. "Do you recognize these as your own size ten shoes?" Bolland held up the bag to her. "Yes," she said without hesitation. "But I did not kill Jerome." This could be it, Garris thought. He urged Mochner closer for the good-cop-bad-cop routine. "It's over, Marietta. Your bloody shoes left at the murder scene, you were the first witness, and the security guards stopped you as you tried to escape the studio. You might as well confess and spare yourself a lot of trouble." Marietta's steel-wool hair stayed impeccable even as her face screwed up with anxiety and she ran a twitching hand through her scalp. "No! I wasn't running away, I panicked!" "You're looking at life, maybe the death penalty." Mochner stepped in, and put a hand on her padded shoulder. "If you cooperate with the FBI," he said softly, "I can promise you a lighter sentence. Don't let this hick cop intimidate you." "Sure, you talk to her," Garris said with exaggerated gruffness. "I'll go talk to the producer." Garris wasn't nearly as convinced as he pretended to be. There were far too many loose threads, and he hadn't even scraped the most obvious mass of evidence: video footage. "Maxim, is someone in the control room now?" "'Course not. We're all here." "Take as many people as you need into the control room and establish an audio link to this room. I want to stay in touch with you from here. We're going to show the video footage from the time of the murder on the big wall here, and use it to establish who went to the bathrooms. Sergeant Bolland will come with you. Sergeant? Make sure none of them tries to run out some backdoor." "Right." The producer had no objections, and the crew were quick to oblige his commands. Bolland followed Maxim and two technicians through the door to the control room. Meanwhile, Mochner was offering a handkerchief to a weeping Marietta Radkowicz. He gave Garris a reproachful stare; Garris couldn't figure out whether it was an act or not. "She confessed yet?" "I don't think she did it, Garris." "I told you that," she sobbed. "Control room's ready!" Curt Maxim's voice played loudly through the studio speakers; on the big video wall behind the pulpit appeared the America's Contenders logo. "What do you want to see first?" "What time was it when you found Jerome's body, Marietta?" "Around seven forty-five." "Maxim, show us the view at the entrance to the bathroom corridor, at seven o'clock."
The video wall flickered, and everyone in the room could see the high-contrast color image of the corner with the sign BATHROOMS. The digital timer in the corner counted the hours, minutes and seconds. "Okay, now fast-forward, and freeze the image when someone shows up." The timer speeded forward until it reached 19:40, and stopped. A figure wearing a large long raincoat, brown leather shoes and rubber gloves was walking around the corner and into the bathroom corridor. But the person was also wearing a baseball cap - the same type as the producer and some crewmembers wore. The cap, and the turned-up lapels of the raincoat, blocked the view of the wearer's face. Whoever was hiding underneath the cap and the raincoat took care to look away from the camera above. The person was carrying a plastic bag with something in it. "Zoom in!" The control room enlarged the still image; Garris stepped to the side and pointed at the grainy figure on the video wall. "Does anyone recognize this person or the person's clothes?" The remaining four crewmembers, the two security guards, the three candidates and the FBI men watched the image in silence. From the control room came no response. The slight from-above angle of the image, and the way the person's shadow was blotted out by the multiple lightsources, made it impossible to judge his or her height. And the figure passed too briefly for an estimate of the way he or she walked. But the person's shoes, coat and gloves were the same as the ones found bloodied next to Salomonson's corpse. Garris knew better than to ask the suspects who had size twelve in shoes, and how many pairs. He whispered to Mochner to go and check the cloakroom for size twelve shoes, and secretly hide them in a plastic bag if he found any. It was a long shot, but they might just be lucky... The suspects refused to admit or assign blame about the figure on the screen. He could almost sense their hostility to him, as if he were simply an intruder in their little closed universe. But one of them had to be obsessed about Jerome Salomonson, fixated enough to want him dead and humiliated before the world. Someone who either resented Salomonson's popularity and fame, or was more personally involved with him. "Okay," he said to the control room, "fast-forward again." The timer rushed forward to 19:41; the raincoat figure did not return from the bathrooms. Another figure passed by the camera, walking in the same direction: Jerome Salomonson. "Stop!" The recently dead froze in the middle of a forward step, his right foot hovering over the carpet. He was a superficially handsome man, dressed in a suit like the other contestants. What had been on the man's mind, Garris wondered, as he walked toward his own death? Did he simply need to go to the bathroom, or was he headed for a secret meeting? Jerome appeared to be walking at a brisk pace, leaning slightly forward as if braving a rainstorm, and carried some document or leaflet in his hand. His facial expression was impossible to read in any detail, but he was not smiling. "Zoom in on the paper in his hand!" The image flickered and the screen was filled with the even grainier view of a hand holding a small bundle of white paper pages. There was some writing on it, but Garris couldn't make out individual letters. "Maxim, can you make the image sharp enough to read the letters?" "Okay!" The image lost all color, and the grainy texture vanished. In stark black-and-white contrast, one could discern large-letter handwriting on the page. Garris squinted. "I can read the first line: 'My'... something... 'Jerome'... the rest is a blur. Can you read it too?" The guards and several crewmembers nodded and murmured approval. Mochner went up close to the image. He said, "It reads, 'My beloved Jerome.'" "Okay, forward again." The colors returned; the screen timer counted rapidly to 19:44. The killer returned from the bathroom corridor, still wearing the large long raincoat, cap and gloves, with plastic bag in one hand. "Stop!" He turned to his quiet, rapt audience. "What's missing in this picture?" Garris pointed to the figure's bare feet wearing dark socks. "The killer left a pair of bloodied shoes, Marietta's shoes, next to the victim's body." Marietta, who was standing near the pulpit, stopped wiping her eyes. Her eyliner had formed dark pools underneath her eyes, and she stared at the video wall. Garris glanced at her but failed to read her expression. He tried to picture her luring the bachelor Salomonson to the bathroom with a love letter, promising an off-camera meeting between competitors... but it rang false. The women Garris knew who dressed like Marietta, and had her level of ambition, would never arrange love trysts inside a cramped toilet - not under any circumstances. Mochner was right. It didn't seem her style, plus the clumsiness of leaving one's own shoes at the murder scene. The killer had tried to frame her. "Forward, then play!" Again a quick rush, to 19:45. There came Marietta Radkowicz at last, walking without haste toward the bathrooms, and passed out of view. Then came her high-pitched, off-camera scream. "Curt! Oh my God!" Immediately, staggering backward with her eyes fixed on a point ahead of her, she came back into view, then turned and fled. One could hear her shouting recede, but the carpet muted the sound of her steps. "Fast forward." The timer flickered forward until 19:46, when one security guard and Marietta came rushing toward the bathroom corridor, talking. The guard muttered a curse, and talked into his radio to his colleague. "Okay, kill the sound." The scene played out in silence behind Garris, and he asked the audience: "Is it possible to walk past that corner, and then remove a raincoat and gloves in a blind spot where you won't be caught on tape?" Several crewmembers spoke up. "Yes!" "There's a dead angle between that corner and the dressing-rooms." Garris said, "Then there is a plastic bag with another raincoat and a pair of gloves somewhere here in the studio. The guards and the FBI people will go searching for it now. The rest of you stay where you are."
"Damn," Garris said. And to the audience: "Everybody who normally wear size twelve shoes, raise a hand!" No one raised a hand. "Well, forget about it, Mochner. The killer was smart enough to bring more than one pair, and probably not his regular size anyway." "Actually," Mochner said, "I wear size twelve. But I didn't kill Jerome Salomonson." "A personal question..." "Yes?" "Would you say the victim was the kind of man who attracted other men... of that persuasion?" It was Mochner's turn to frown; maybe Garris had hit a nerve. "There's been rumors in the fan community that Salomonson was gay, but there's always that rumor about anyone who's good-looking, famous and single. I understand what you're asking, Garris... but I've got no gay x-ray vision that magically reveals who's sleeping with who. Sorry. If he was, he hid it very well." "I had to ask." "No offense taken." Garris cupped his hands around his mouth and talked into Mochner's ear, to make sure the control room wouldn't pick him up on the many microphones. "Marietta's not the killer. But it's not one of the other contestants either. They'd never risk their reputation in a TV show, and they feel they are being watched all the time. So it has to be someone who feels confident and anonymous around all these cameras and mikes, and knows all the blind spots... a member of the crew, probably a man... no offense intended. Could be the guy with size ten shoes. Or Curt Maxim, the producer." Mochner imitated Garris's manner of communication, and replied: "Maxim is pot-bellied. The guy in the raincoat didn't look fat to me." "It was a big coat, and the killer went past the camera for about a second. Maxim could easily tuck in his belly for that long. They are roughly the same height." "Okay, so take the both of them in for questioning." "Both of them will deny guilt." "Then wait for technical evidence to turn up. Or go through all the surveillance tapes and puzzle it together." "The BOBC will throw their best lawyers at me. And then the media will turn it into a circus." "Boy! You are camera-shy, detective." "Yes." But it was not the whole truth. Mochner got tired of cupping his hands, and talked in a lowered voice. "Everything points to Rick Stein. He fits the profile of a celebrity-killer. Loner, collects memorabilia..." "I know," Garris admitted, sounding as testy as he felt. "It's too obvious. Too many clues are being tossed around here to confuse us. And how did the killer get into the toilet? Stein isn't exactly a muscleman, if you want to pursue that angle." Mochner took a look at Stein, who sat with his chin propped up in his arms, somewhat apart from the others. The man was neither skinny nor fat, prematurely balding and ugly; his neck had a permanent bend, resembling a turkey. In his hands he was holding a baseball cap, like the one on the tape. "Maybe he's got a nice voice." The FBI agents rushed into the room with a raincoat, and presented it to Garris and Mochner. It perfectly matched the one found in the toilet. "We found it hanging on the coat rack, among the other jackets and coats." "Whose raincoat is this?" Garris asked the crew. Several crewmembers claimed that it belonged to Rick Stein, the crewman with the size ten shoes. Stein seemed shocked; he would not move when Garris walked up to him. "Where were you at seven forty-five, sir?" "I was out having a smoke," Stein said, his voice like crushed gravel. Mochner shrugged at Garris. "I swear to God. Went out the main entrance." Garris sniffed the man's head, then the raincoat. He could smell the tobacco odor on both. Too bad, he thought, that the show wasn't taped in Smell-O-Vision. "Were you caught on camera when you went out?" Mochner asked. "Yeah... I think so." "Maxim! Show us the views at the entrance, from seven forty to seven forty-five." The video wall image was split into two separate views from the main hallway. When the timer came to seven forty-four, a figure in Stein's raincoat and cap came in through the door and quickly walked past. But the lapels were upturned and the figure hunched forward, his hands in his coat pockets; the cap blocked out the view of the head from the camera's overhead angle. It was impossible to get a certain ID from that image alone. The figure turned a corner, heading toward the cloakroom, and passed out of view. "It's cold outside," Stein excused himself. "Damn! Maxim, can you show us a view from the cloakroom?" "Sorry, detective," came the reply through the loudspeakers, "that's one of the blind spots." Garris shouted in painstakingly clear syllables: "Did anyone see Stein come in?" One woman in the crew said, "Look, officer, we were busy shooting the show when the murder happened! It was broadcast live today. When Miss Radkowicz came running and screaming murder, we forgot about anything else going on. No one bothered to look for old Rick." Garris wanted to ask Maxim where he had been. He said, "Maxim! Were you anywhere near Rick Stein around seven forty-five?" "I can't recall seeing him." "Where were you? In the control room?" "Uh, I can't quite remember... seven forty-five... yes, I was there. I'd been in my little office room for a while." "Did someone see you leave the control room?" If Maxim understood where Garris's questions were leading, his voice did not reveal it. "Ask the crew!" One of the crew in the studio explained, "When we're in the control room, four of us at once, we're totally focused on the monitors. You could run in and out of there with a whole mariachi band and not be noticed. And there's a small passage from the control room to the office and the cloakrooms, so we can work without getting in the way of the show." "Well, agent," Garris said aside, "I'm stumped. I suppose we'll have to take in Stein, Maxim and Radkowicz for questioning, but it's going to be ugly - with all the vultures waiting outside. And we need to seize the surveillance tapes as evidence. Can you arrange that?" "Of course. If you want time to think..." Garris wanted time to think; time he did not have. How exactly did the killer, wearing raincoat and gloves, end up together with Jerome Salomonson, a slick lawyer, in a cramped toilet where two people can just barely squueze in? Was Salomonson on his way out when he was attacked, or did the killer somehow insinuate himself inside? How did the killer get behind Salomonson and slit his throat so that he splattered the inside of the door? "I've got an idea." Garris addressed the control room. "Maxim," he said out loud, "can the viewers cast their votes on the program right now, even when the show isn't running?" "Of course! The studio sends voting requests to the viewers by text-messaging and e-mail. The results are shown on the video wall as the votes come in." "Great. I want you to run a poll right now, with the following question: 'After Jerome Salomonson's murder, should the series be canceled?' The alternate answers are: A, yes... B, no... and C, don't know. Bolland! Make sure they type in the correct question. I'll be right back. Mochner, come with me. Leave your people here to watch the suspects." The detective and the agent walked out into the corridor. On the video wall, the poll question appeared in large letters; the first votes started to come in almost immediately.
"Let's re-enact this. You are Jerome, you walk past the camera, and..." "...I walk up to the door, I have a handwritten letter in my hand, beginning with 'My Beloved Jerome'..." "Have you read the letter, or are you going there to read the letter in private? It's the only really private spot in the whole studio." Mochner gestured with his index-finger, like an imaginary gun, at himself, then the door. "I have read at least the first line. Either it's a message about a meeting, here, or I'm going here to... wait. Where did the letter go after he was killed?" They both looked inside, at the open jacket of the dead body. "It can't still be on him. After all this trouble, the killer couldn't be that stupid." "And he wouldn't risk carrying it on him..." "Which means..." Garris snapped his fingers. "The killer, or the victim, tried to flush the letter down where no one could find it! But maybe he got in a hurry and didn't have time to flush. Hence the smell. The letter might still be in there." Mochner made a disgusted face. "Shouldn't your sergeant be doing the dirty work?" Garris was grim. "If you're going to play the sissy, I'll do it." The agent turned grave. "I'm not a sissy, detective." They both helped each other remove the police tape. Garris had to lift Salomonson's body off the toilet seat, while Mochner rolled up his sleeves. The body was rather heavy; this only reinforced Garris's conviction that Rick Stein was too puny to have overpowered the stronger Salomonson. Holding his nose with the other hand, Mochner reached down with his arm, bent it and dug deep up into the toilet bowl. Garris looked away, more to spare Mochner the embarrassment than because of his own disgust. Seconds passed, and blood-tinted water splashed up from the bowl as Mochner's hand searched. "Got something! Paper!" "Hope it's not the other kind." "Very funny, detective... careful now, or it'll fall apart..." With a groan, Mochner pulled up his wet arm from the toilet bowl, and fished out a crumpled ball of paper - not tissue, but real paper. "You can put him back." Garris carefully placed the body back on the toilet seat, and followed the agent out of the cramped room. Mochner slowly unfolded the paper into two wet sheets, dyed pink by the blood and water. He held them up to the ceiling lights. The ink had floated out a bit, but the letters were still fairly easy to read. "It says... 'My beloved Jerome... I have to tell you something important... but no one must see or hear us... please wait for me inside the smallest bathroom at 19:45 PM. It would break my heart if the world got to know that you asked me to fix the vote...'" Mochner went red in the face. "The rest is rather personal stuff." He skipped to the ending. "Signed, 'C.'" "Maxim! I knew it." They hurried back to the Forum, told the guards and the Feds to arrest the producer, and went to open the door to the control room. There was a commotion in the narrow space, a groan and several shouts, and a chair was tossed out of the doorway. It hit Mochner in the face and he tumbled backward. A furious Curt Maxim appeared in the doorway, holding one of the female technicians as a shield before him, and he had a knife to her throat. "Anyone move and she's dead!" he yelled in a hoarse voice. "I'm leaving!" Garris had drawn his gun, pointing it at the producer's head, and shouted: "Bolland! Are you okay? Don't shoot!" There was no reply but the confused cries from the remaining technician in there, and the crewmembers in the Forum studio. Ripples of icy fear filled Garris at the thought of Bolland being injured or worse. Mochner was getting to his feet, holding a bloody nose, and groped for his gun. His two assistants were training their weapons on Maxim's body, as did the two security guards. "Drop the knife, Curt!" Garris said in a terse, controlled voice, focusing his eyes on the producer's swollen, hysterical face. "We found your letter to Jerome hidden in the toilet. That's why you hung around us like that... you were trying to flush down the evidence. It's over." Maxim bared his teeth. "I'm the producer! I created this show! I can make or break people! You too, pig!" "How did you get behind him inside the toilet? Explain how you did it. I've got to know. And why there, of all places?" Maxim seemed stunned by Garris's blunt questions. Then he laughed. "What do you think, pig? It was the only place we could talk without being seen or heard! We had to stand up to fit inside. I grabbed his hair and slit his throat. Then I flushed his letter down the toilet, but I heard the flushing didn't finish, so I thought the letter had got stuck in there. I got the idea to make it look like he'd been taking a crap, so people wouldn't want to search the toilet bowl or wonder why he wasn't coming out, until I got the time to fix it. But... but I got short on time, so I had to leave before I was done. Then the cops showed up." "But why? Were you lovers?" "The slick bastard thought he could take control of the show through me! First he seduced me, then he tried to persuade and blackmail me to make him win! He threatened to ruin my show if I didn't do what he wanted." Maxim let out a sob. "There's an army of cops and media crews waiting outside, Curt. You'll be crucified out there." The technician gasped in Maxim's grip, her eyes wide and terrified. He dragged her before him in short, jerking steps, toward the exit. "I know the media. I can spin it to my advantage." "But you couldn't spin Jerome?" Garris asked. "So you had to cancel him?" "He was trying to run my show!" "Don't shoot!" Garris ordered. He noticed something in the faces of the astonished TV crew; they were watching not just the producer and his hostage, but the video wall behind Garris... He took a quick glance over his shoulder. And he had to smile; the world had not gone to the dogs just yet. "Look," he said, pointing to the big screen. "The ratings are in." Curt Maxim stared at the big display of computer graphics. Under the headlined question, 'After Jerome Salomonson's murder, should the series be canceled?' were three columns. The "No" column stood at roughly 30% of the total vote. The "Don't Know" stood at 10%. The "Yes" column was leading big, at a slowly increasing 60%. Maxim stood frozen for a few seconds, and the color quickly drained from his face. Then he let go of the woman, and moved to cut his own throat. Mochner was on his feet and grabbed the man's knife-hand. In the next moment, the guards and the FBI agents were pinning the producer to the floor, and struggled to handcuff him. Mochner stood up, wiped his nose on his sleeve and faced Garris. A grim smile played on the agent's face. Garris didn't feel like smiling. "Good work, Garris. You solved the case in time for the next commercial." He chuckled. "So why that hangdog face? You look almost... guilty." Had Mochner seen through him, guessed his secret shame? Garris was fully aware of his own secret, and every day he struggled with it: he was vain, perhaps more than most people. But all the same he tried to suppress the urge to be seen. It was penance for the one time he had been weak, when he was young, and someone else had paid for it. "I keep my word. He's all yours. And the glory." "I did stick my hand in the toilet. Have to send my best coat to the dry-cleaner. Honestly, Garris, don't you want at least a bit of the credit? Do you suffer some sort of shyness syndrome?" "Humor me." Mochner began to make a handshake, but checked himself, sniffed his right hand, and offered Garris his left hand instead. "Call me sometime." They shook hands, as professionals congratulating each other after a job well done. Garris looked at the video wall again; the votes were still pouring in, but the "No" camp was still leading by a thirty-percent margin. He had a terrible thought. "Bolland!" He ran into the control room. The sergeant was there, leaning on a control panel, holding his forehead, while the remaining technician was applying a band-aid on Bolland's hand. Garris suppressed a grin of relief. "What happened?" "Producer went crazy, started throwing chairs and stuff. But he didn't get my gun. Did you get him, sir?" "We got him, sergeant. We got him. If someone asks, the case was solved by Mochner of the FBI. Right?" Bolland straightened up and nodded. "Riiight." he walked out of the control room with the technician, and stopped to watch the agents take the handcuffed Curt Maxim outside. "What was the motive?" "Vanity." The three competitors of the show stood in a corner, talking to each other. Garris went over to them, joined by the sergeant. "It's over, folks. You're free to go. You'll probably be called to testify at Maxim's trial." He faced Marietta, who did not seem pleased to have him near her. "Please accept my apologies for the rough words, Mrs. Radkowicz. We were just testing a possible lead. It was not personal. I played the bad cop, so I had to exaggerate." "I was just discussing that with my colleagues here," she said. "We are traumatized and shocked, and the media will surely hear about this abusive behavior..." Garris cleared his throat; it tasted of bile. Time to put an end to this twisted show, he thought. "All right. If you don't want the public to turn on you, I suggest you start thinking of how you're going to show your sympathy for Jerome Salomonson, instead of whining about your 'trauma'. The case is now in the hands of the FBI. Good night!" He left the stunned trio and went for the exit. He patted the sergeant's shoulder. "Let's not keep your wife up and worried. I'll call the station once we're out of this madhouse. Is there a backdoor we could use?" "Afraid not, sir. The guards locked all the other exits." "Sometimes I hate this job. Anything good on TV?" "There's always Bonanza."
Other Detective Garris stories:
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Other Detective Garris stories:
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