Jeff Sherratt - Guilty or Else

“Yeah, I remember you,” he responded, tapping the card on the counter. “Mitch is the graveyard guy.”

“Is he here? I need to see him for a moment.”

The officer glanced at the clock hanging on the wall behind him. “His shift’s over. Got off at nine, but let me check, might still be in the locker room.”

He retreated to one of the battered steel desks, pushed an intercom knob and spoke into it. A few seconds later, he came back and said Mitch would be right out.

“You waiting for me?” Mitch looked more like a surfer than a cop. He had on a Hang Ten T-shirt, cut-off Levis, and open-toed sandals. His hair was streaked blond from the sun.

“You’re the officer who took the anonymous call involving the Graham murder?”

“Yeah, what about it?”

“Got a minute? I need some information.”

“Who in the heck are you?”

I reached out to shake his hand. “Name’s O’Brien. I’m a lawyer now, but used to be on the LAPD, worked night watch out of Newton Street.” I figured I’d toss out the cop routine, maybe develop some rapport-just one of the boys. “I’ve got a couple of questions. Won’t take long. Can I buy you a cup of coffee, some breakfast?” I wanted to get him out of the station before Hodges spotted us talking.

“Newton, huh? Tough division. How long on the job?”

“Since before the Watts Riots.”

“Wow, I was in junior high at the time. Must’ve been rough. What was it like?”

“C’mon, I’ll tell you over breakfast.”

“Sure, why not?”

We took separate cars to the Pancake House, a down-home type of place on Atlantic, south of Firestone. The tired, clapboard restaurant had been there forever. The place had Formica tables, sticky with syrup, the wooden chairs didn’t match, and the overweight waitress was probably named Flo. It seemed all these diners had a waitress named Flo.

The waitress came and poured coffee into cups that were already on the table. “The special this morning is pigs-in-a-blanket, two eggs, dollar-ninety-five,” she said as she passed the menus to us. Mitch ordered the special. She looked at me.

“I’ll just have coffee, Flo,” I said.

“Who’s Flo?”

I laughed at my slip of the tongue. “I’m sorry, Miss.”

“The name’s Jacqueline, but you can call me Jackie.” She turned her head slightly to the side and lifted her chin. “Some people say I look like my namesake, Jackie Kennedy.”

She looked more like Jackie Gleason than Jackie Kennedy. “Yeah, Flo. I can see it, except she has dark hair. Otherwise, dead ringer,” I said.

She smiled and rushed away to fetch the food.

Mitch shook his head and laughed. “Did she say Jackie Kennedy? Jesus .”

“Ah, Mitch, maybe she looked like Jackie O thirty years ago, who knows. I think when we get older, we still see ourselves as we were when we were in our prime. Nothing wrong with that.”

“You’re all right, O’Brien. I like your attitude.”

“Can I ask you about that call?”

“Well, I guess so,” he said, hesitantly. “What do you want to know?”

“Can you describe the voice?”

“Male, adult, no accent or out of the ordinary characteristics, just a voice,” he said slowly, obviously thinking.

I already knew the time that the call was made, around four in the morning, and I had the exact words the caller had said. The information was in the police report, but I confirmed it with Mitch just the same. It would’ve made things easier if the South Gate Police Department had recorded the call, but unlike the LAPD and Sheriff’s Department, they weren’t equipped to do so.

When Jackie arrived with the food, I remained silent. After she left, I asked, “Would you recognize the voice if you heard it again?”

“Yeah, I think so.” He thought for a moment, “I might be imagining this, but the guy had a familiar voice, like I heard it before, just can’t place it. It’d help if he said some of the same words. You know, dead girl-gardener did it, stuff like that.”

Mitch could’ve heard Welch’s speeches on television a few times, and that could be why the voice had sounded familiar. I thought about the tape. I made a mental note to call him at the police station tomorrow night when he’d be on duty and play a small portion of it to see if he could I.D. Welch’s voice as the anonymous caller.

“You must get a lot of calls,” I said.

“Quite a few, but this is the only one I’ve had involving a murder. The caller’s voice is still ringing in my ear. When he said dead girl, I froze for a second. Yeah, if I heard the guy’s voice I’d recognize it. Why? You got a recording of a phone call, or something?”

“Nah, just thinking ahead. Trial coming up, you know.”

“Guess you lawyers have to cover all the bases. I’m thinking of going back to school someday, become a lawyer like you.”

“How long you been on the force, Mitch?”

“Three and a half months. Not counting the academy.”

He wouldn’t make it to four months if Hodges found out he’d talked to me without his authorization. “A regular veteran,” I laughed. “I think it would be a good idea to keep this discussion between ourselves.”

“Think so? Why?”

“Because I’m going to solve the case and when I do, I’ll let you have the collar. Boost your career. Don’t want Hodges hogging all the glory.”

“Thought they already had the guy.”

“Got the wrong guy. Anyway, what do you have to lose? If I find the real killer, you got the collar. If I don’t, well, so what?”

“Nothing to lose. Okay,” he said. “I’ll keep quiet.” We stopped talking for a moment, then he added, “You know, there’s one more thing about the call that night that I just remembered. But I don’t think it’s important.” Mitch took a sip of coffee and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Think I should tell Hodges about it?”

“Mitch, at this point, I wouldn’t tell him anything. He’ll just get pissed and make it hard on you. But, anyway, what about the call?”

“It was long distance. When I picked up the phone, the guy was putting the last of the coins in the slot, quarters. I could hear them drop.” He nodded and took a bite of his sausage. “Now tell me about the riots.”

I made it back to the office from South Gate in record time. “Sol?” I asked Rita as I opened the door and walked in.

“Sorry,” she said. “Haven’t heard a word.”

Now I was really worried. I grabbed the phone on Rita’s desk and dialed Mabel at the answering service. No calls. I phoned Joyce, Sol’s secretary. She hadn’t heard from him either. We’d just have to wait.

“I’ve got something else for you to take care of,” I said to her. “Can you check with the phone company, the one that handles the Sacramento area? I need to see if any long distance calls were made to South Gate from a payphone, probably somewhere near the airport. Can’t be too many calls, it was made about four in the morning, the morning after the murder.”

“Okay, Jimmy. I’ll have to use an associate from that area. It’ll take a day or so.”

I put the receiver down and glanced at Rita. “What are you typing?”

“A memo to the landlord.”

“Oh?”

“The air conditioner needs to be repaired; it rattles. Can’t have that kind of racket when we’re interviewing clients,” she said.

Clients. “Okay,” I said and went to my office. I had nothing to do now but wait. So I messed around with the Rodriguez file, looking for some sort of revelation that might come to me. Some speck of information that I may have overlooked. Nothing. An hour later, I asked Rita if she wanted to have lunch. She called Mabel at the answering service and told her to pick up the calls. We’d be back in an hour.