Lee Goldberg: McGrave

The bastard is out there somewhere. And McGrave is going to find him.

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It's a warm, sunny Sunday morning, which is another way of saying there's a stage-two smog alert and Los Angeles residents are strongly advised to stay indoors and not breathe more than is absolutely necessary.

McGrave is at his cluttered cubicle, studying a coroner's photo of Otto's tattoo and talking on the phone.

He asks the watch commander in the North Hollywood station to:

1. Send some patrol cars around to the local Laundromats and see if anybody has complained that some of their laundry is missing or if they've seen a guy who looks like he was shot and thrown off a cliff. 2. Get him a list of any cars reported stolen in the area since nine p.m. The same goes for any reports of break-ins at homes, drugstores, or doctors' offices.

McGrave figures that when the German staggers out of the hills, he's going to want clothes that aren't soaked with blood, a car to get as far from the area as possible, and drugs to kill the pain and prevent infection.

The watch commander agrees to help.

McGrave hangs up and catches a whiff of spearmint in the air, so he starts delivering his update on the case even before Captain Thackery shows up at his cubicle.

"I ran the faces and prints of the three dead thieves past U.S. Customs. Turns out they arrived from Berlin on three separate flights over the last two days. Customs has double-checked the passports. They're fakes."

The captain leans on the wobbly, chest-high wall of McGrave's cubicle and swallows his mint.

"I just got off the phone with the chief, who has already heard from Wallengren's attorney," Thackery says. "Tomorrow they're going to file a lawsuit against the city for twenty million dollars in damages."

"That much? I've got to hold on to my toilet," McGrave says. "In three thousand years, it could be worth a fortune."

"There's more. Frank Russell wants you arrested for attempted murder. He says you shot him because he's sleeping with your ex."

"I shot Frank to nail the guy who was holding a gun to his head."

"The security camera footage and audio strongly back Frank's side of the story. The DA is taking this very seriously and is contemplating charges. But the chief isn't waiting for the DA's decision. He wants you off the street now."

"You're suspending me?"

"I'm firing you. You have twenty minutes to clean out your desk and get the hell out of here."

"You can't just fire me, Roy. There's a whole bunch of tedious, bureaucratic crap you have to go through first, hearings and review boards and that kind of thing. It'll be weeks, maybe months, before you can actually fire me. So in the meantime, I'll catch the bastard responsible for all of this and everything will be fine."

"You don't get it, McGrave. It's a done deal. The city is tired of getting sued every time you step out of the building. I'm tired of the aggravation. And you won't find any support with your union rep. They're standing behind Frank on this one."

"Looks like your 'do nothing' approach to policing is catching on," McGrave says. "I guess this means I can't count on you as a reference."

"I'd look into a new profession, because you're finished as a cop in this city or anywhere else. No police force is going to hire you with lawsuits and criminal charges hanging over your head. Leave your gun and your badge on my desk before you go."

The captain walks away.

McGrave is just beginning to absorb the magnitude of what has happened to him when his cell phone rings. He grabs it and answers out of reflex.

"McGrave," he says.

"She was the only woman who was ever more to me than a warm body in my bed."

McGrave sits up straight in his chair, his professional problems forgotten.

It's the German.

It's a cramped little bathroom with bloody towels on the linoleum floor, a bloody pair of needle-nose pliers in the blood-splashed sink, and a bloody bullet in the bloody soap dish.

Perhaps you're sensing a theme here.

Richter stands in front of the mirror in a clean but oversize white shirt, his left arm in a crude sling fashioned from a towel. He's studying his reflection and holding a portable home phone in his good hand. He's clean-shaven and his hair is washed, but his skin is a sickly pale and his brow is already dappled with perspiration.

But considering that he just dug a bullet out of his shoulder with pliers, doused the wound with rubbing alcohol, and stitched it shut with dental floss, he looks fucking great.

"She died with her eyes open," he says. "Did you look into them, McGrave?"

McGrave looks at the caller ID on his phone.

It reads "John McGrave." The son of a bitch is in his house.

"Yeah, I did," McGrave says.

"Then you know what I am going to see when I look into your eyes at the end of our next encounter."

Richter opens the medicine cabinet behind the mirror, sorts through the prescription medication until he finds what he wants. Vicodin. He pockets it.

"It's a date," McGrave says. "Make yourself comfy. I'll be home in ten minutes."

Richter steps into the bedroom. The bed is unmade. The furniture looks like it was bought used from a Motel 6. He glances at a framed photo on the dresser of McGrave, his ex-wife, and his teenage daughter, all of them soaking wet and laughing as they try to wash an uncooperative bulldog in a plastic kiddie pool.

"You have a nice family. I'll be back for them, too."

He tosses the phone on the bed and steps over the carcass of the bulldog, a kitchen knife buried to the hilt in its throat, as he walks out.

Whoever designed Berlin-Tegel Airport had a fetish for hexagons. The terminal is shaped like a hexagon. The pillars are hexagons. The floor tiles are hexagons. The ceiling lights are part of a gridwork of interlocking hexagons. Outside, there are hexagonal concrete benches on a hexagonal-patterned sidewalk bordering a hexagonal parking lot.

The architect probably slept in a hexagonal bed in a hexagonal apartment and made his girlfriend wear hexagonal underwear.

But the hexagons go unnoticed by John McGrave as he emerges from the terminal into the chilly Berlin night carrying only an overstuffed gym bag.

He's a man on a mission.

McGrave stands out in the crowd of stylishly dressed and stylishly disinterested Europeans. He is wearing a beat-up leather jacket, a loud Hawaiian shirt, faded jeans, and dirty tennis shoes. And yes, they're the same clothes he was wearing on Saturday. Be glad you weren't the passenger sitting next to him in coach on the fourteen-hour flight, because he hasn't shaved, or bathed, in almost two days.

He approaches a line of tan E-Class Mercedes sedans idling at the curb. The driver of the first car, a short Turkish man with a thin mustache, steps forward and reaches for McGrave's bag. But McGrave holds it out of reach.

"No, thanks," McGrave says. "I want a taxi."

The driver gestures to his car. "This is a taxi."

"That's a limo. I want a taxi."

The driver points to the other Mercedes behind his. "All taxis."

"Do I look like I can afford a ride like that? Forget the der limo. I want the der taxi. Where are the der taxis?"

Again, the driver points to the other Mercedes. "Here. There. All taxis."

"Okay, I see them," McGrave says. "Now show me where I can find the cheap ones."

Ladies and gentlemen, Tidal Wave is in Berlin.

During the Cold War, the shopping district of Kurfьrstendamm, known by locals as the Ku'damm, was a garish, glittering, glaring beacon of conspicuous consumption, shining bright from the walled island of Capitalism that was surrounded by the red sea of Communist East Germany.

But since the wall fell, all the action has moved to Mitte, the reinvigorated heart of old Berlin, and the Ku'damm has had to change. Its vibrancy today comes less from the big stores, fancy restaurants, historic relics, and tourist traps on the main thoroughfare than from the eclectic mix of cafйs, galleries, "sex kinos," boutiques, and bars to be found on the side streets.