Angle of Investigation: Three Harry Bosch Short Stories Read online

  “Sorry, man, not into jazz. Too much of a cliché, you know? Detectives and jazz. I listen to country myself.”

  Bosch felt disappointed. He wanted to tell him about that day on the ship but if Braxton didn’t know jazz it couldn’t be explained.

  “What’s the connection?” Braxton asked.

  Bosch held up the saxophone.

  “This was his. It says inside here, ‘Custom made for Quentin McKinzie.’ That’s Sugar Ray McK.”

  “You ever see him play?”

  Bosch nodded.

  “One time. Nineteen sixty-nine.”

  Braxton whistled.

  “Long time ago. You think he’s still alive?”

  “I don’t know. He’s not recording. Last disc he put out was Man with an Ax. That was at least ten years ago. Maybe longer. It was a compilation.”

  Bosch looked at the saxophone.

  “Can’t record without this anyway, I suppose.”

  Bosch’s cell phone chirped. It was Edgar.

  “Harry, whereyat?”

  “On the way back to the station. We just checked out Kelman’s apartment.”

  “Anything?”

  “Not really. A junkie and a saxophone. What have you got?”

  “First off, we’ve got lividity issues. This guy was moved.”

  “And what’s the ME say about cause?”

  “He’s going with your theory at the moment. Electrocution. The burns on the hand and foot—where the juice went in and out.”

  “You find the source?Kelm sasource?

  “I looked around. Can’t find it.”

  Bosch thought about all of this. Postmortem lividity was the settling of the blood in a dead body. It was a purple gravity line. If a body is moved after the blood has settled, then a new gravity line will appear. It is an easy tip-off that most people outside of homicide investigation don’t know about.

  “You looked around the case where the glove was?”

  “Yeah, I looked. I can’t find any electrical source that can explain this. The case you’re talking about has internal lighting but there’s no malfunction.”

  Braxton pulled into the parking lot behind the station and into a spot reserved for investigators’ cars.

  “You do a property inventory on the guy yet?”

  “Yeah, nothing. Pockets empty. No ID or anything else.”

  “All right, we’re at the cop shop. Let me think about it and call you back.”

  “Whatever, Harry. I just want to get out of here on time tonight and I don’t like the looks of this.”

  “I know, I know.”

  Bosch closed the phone and got out of the car with the saxophone.

  “What has he got?” Braxton asked.

  “Nothing much,” Bosch said over the top of the car. “It looks like an electrocution.”

  “You called it.”

  “When we get in, can you pull the reports on the three prior B and Es at Three Kings?”

  “You got it. What about Servan?”

  “I’ll check on him but I’m going to let him sit for a while.”

  They went into the station and down to the detective bureau, where they split up, Braxton going to the burglary corral to get the reports, and Bosch to the rear hallway that led to the interview rooms. Servan was in interview room 3, pacing in the small space when Bosch opened the door.

  “Mr. Servan, are you okay? It shouldn’t be too much longer.”

  “Yeah, okay, okay. You find?”

  He pointed to the saxophone. Bosch nodded.

  “Did this come from your store?”

  Servan studied the instrument and nodded vigorously.

  “I think so, yes.”

  “Okay, well, we’ll find out for sure. We’ve got a few things to do and then we’ll get back to you. You want some coffee or to use the bathroom?”

  Servan declined both and Bosch left him there. When he got to the homicide table he started looking for Quentin McKinzie, running searches on the DMV, voter registration and crime index computers. He came up with a record of drug arrests in Los Angeles in the 1970s and 1980s but no address and nothing that gave a clue to his current whereabouts.

  Braxton came over and dropped three thin files on his desk. Bosch told him to take the photo of Monty Kelman they had pulled off the computer and show it to Servan to see if he recognized Kelman as ever coming into the shop as a customer.

  After Braxton was gone Bosch started looking through the burglary reports, beginning with the first break-in at Three Kings. He quickly flipped through the pages until he got to the stolen-property inventory. There was no saxophone on the list. He scanned the items listed and determined they were all small pieces taken from the lighted display cabinet.

  He flipped back to the summary, which had been written by Braxton. It reported that the unknown suspect or suspects had broken through the rear door to enter the establishment, then had emptied the display case containing the highest-value items in the shop. Braxton noted that the display case had a key lock that had either been left unlocked or was expertly picked by the thief.

  He went on to the next report and found a saxophone listed on the stolen-property inventory. It was described as an alto saxophone but there were no other identifiers and no listing of who the person was who had pawned the saxophone. He read the summary and found it mirrored the summary in the first burglary report; the burglar or burglars broke through the rear door, opened the display case and took all of the high-price valuables. The saxophone appeared to have been taken as an afterthought and Bosch knew now that that was because Monty Kelman had always wanted to learn to play the instrument.

  The third report was the same, with the exception of the method of entry. This time, with the back door fortified, the burglar or burglars cut through the composite roof and dropped down. The lock on the display case was picked and the shelves emptied for the third time.

  The losses from the three burglaries averaged out to $40,000 a hit. Servan had insurance—though Bosch assumed the premiums were ever increasing. Most of the items stolen were sale items, meaning their original owners had let the pawn period lapse and ownership now belonged to Servan.

  Braxton walked out of the back hallway and came to the homicide table.

  “Yeah, he recognizes him,” he said. “Said he came into the store a couple days ago. Looked at some of the coins in the case.”

  “He ever see him before that?”

  osseze=ze="3">He thinks so but can’t be sure.”

  “Anybody else work in that shop besides him?”

  “No, he’s a one-man show. Six days a week, nine to six. Your average hardworking immigrant story.”

  Bosch leaned back in his chair and combed one side of his mustache with his thumb. He didn’t say anything. After a few moments Braxton got tired of waiting.

  “Harry, what else you need from me?”

  Bosch didn’t look up at him.

  “Um, can you go back in there and ask him about the case?”

  “The case? You mean the display cabinet?”

  “Yeah, ask him if he’s sure he locked it every time. On all the burglaries.”

  He could tell Braxton was still waiting by the table.

  “What?”

  “What am I? The errand boy here?”

  “No, Brax, you’re the guy he trusts. Go ask him the question.”

  Bosch waited, stroking his mustache and thinking. Braxton wasn’t long.

  “He said he absolutely locks that case. Even when he’s open for business it’s locked. He only unlocks it to put something in or take something out. Then he relocks it, every time. He keeps the key with him, all the time. There are no copies.”

  “So then our guy used picks.”

  “Looks that way.”

  Bosch nodded.

  “Um, one more thing, Brax. The saxophone. He has to keep pawn records, right?”

  “He has to keep them and we get copied as well. The pawn detail. They compare pawn inventori
es to stolen-property reports. You know, look for matches.”

  Bosch reached over and lifted the saxophone off the desk.

  “So then how can I find out who pawned this?”

  Braxton seemed mildly taken aback.

  “What’s it got to do with all of this?”

  “Nothing, as far as I know. But I want to find out who pawned it.”

  “It shouldn’t be too hard. The guys in the detail keep everything separated by store.wited by s In shoeboxes. They could just look through the box for Three Kings. Depending on how far back they go, it might be in there.”

  “What would work better, if you call them or I call them?”

  “They’re not going to like it either way, but let me take a crack at it.”

  “Thanks, man.”

  Bosch looked at his watch. It was almost noon.

  “And tell them we’d like to hear back on it today.”

  “I’ll tell them but I doubt they’ll make any promises. It’s Christmas Eve, Harry. People are trying to get home early.”

  “Just tell them it’s important.”

  “To you or the case?”

  Bosch didn’t answer and eventually Braxton went back to his desk to make the call. Bosch looked through the three burglary reports again. When he finished he got up and went down the back hallway to the interview rooms. Instead of going into 3, where Servan was, he went into 4 and looked through the mirrored glass at the pawnbroker. He was sitting at the table with his arms folded and his eyes closed. He was either sleeping or meditating. Maybe both.

  He left the room and went back to the homicide table. He sat down and picked up the saxophone again. He liked handling it, the feel and weight of it in his grasp. Knowing that the instrument could produce a sound that echoed all the sadness and hope of humanity gave him pause. Again, he remembered the day on the ship. Sugar Ray bobbing and weaving through “The Sweet Spot” and a few other tunes. Bosch fell in love with the sound that day. It felt like it had come from somewhere deep within himself. He was not the same after that day.

  He came out of the memory and walked over to a shelf that ran above the row of file cabinets. He took down one of the forensics manuals and turned to the index. He found what he wanted and went to the page. He was sitting down, reading the manual, when his cell phone chirped and he dug it out of his pocket. It was Edgar.

  “Harry, they’re about to clear here. You want me to come in?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Well, what are we doing?”

  “There was nothing with the body, right? No tools, no picks?”

  “That’s right. I already told you.”

  “I just read through the reports from the three priors. That display case was hit each time. It was picked. Servan said it was always locked.”

  “Well, we got no lock picks here, Harry. I guess whoever moved the body took the picks.”

  “It was Servan.”

  Edgar was quiet and then said, “Why don’t you run it down for me, Harry.”

  Bosch thought for a moment before speaking.

  “He’d been hit three times in two years. Every time the high-end case was picked. It’s hard to work a set of picks with gloves on. Servan probably knew that the one time this guy took off his gloves was to work the picks. Steel picks going into a steel lock.”

  “If he put a hundred ten volts into that lock, it could’ve shut this guy’s heart down.”

  “Not necessarily. I’ve been sitting here reading one of the manuals. One-ten can stop your heart, but it all depends on the amps. There’s a formula. It has to do with resistance to the charge. You know, like dry skin versus moist skin, things like that.”

  “This guy just took his glove off. He probably had sweaty hands.”

  “Exactly. So if the resistance was low and Servan had somehow rigged a one-ten line going directly into that lock, then the initial jolt could have contracted the muscles and left our burglar unable to let go of the pick. The juice goes through him, hits the heart and the heart goes into V-fib.”

  “Ventricular fibrillation is a natural cause, Harry.”

  “Not when you use one-ten to get it.”

  “Then we’re talking more than just homicide. This is lying in wait.”

  “The DA can decide all of that. We just have to bring in the facts.”

  “By the way, how’d you know to take off his sock and look for the exit burn?”

  “The burns on his fingers. I saw them and just took a shot.”

  “Well, I’d say you hit the bull’s-eye, partner.”

  “Got lucky. So now you have to get into that case and find out how he wired it. Did SID leave?”

  “They’re still packing up.”

  “Tell them to take the case as evidence.”

  “The whole case? It’s ten feet long.”

  “Tell them to take it with them. You go with it. The case is the key. And tell them to be careful with it.”

  “They’re going to have to get a Special Services truck out here.”

  “Whatever. Call them now. Get it done.”

  Bosch closed the phone and got up from his desk. He went down the hallway past the watch office to the locker rooms. He bought two packages of peanut butter crackers from the vending machine. He opened one and ate all the squares while he was walking back to the detective bureau. He put the other package in his coat pocket for later. He stopped once on the way back to get a drink from the water fountain.

  Braxton was waiting for him at the homicide table with a sheet of paper in his hand.

  “You got lucky,” he told Bosch as he approached. “The guy pawned that saxophone two years ago but they still had the slip.”

  He gave the sheet of paper to Bosch. It was a photocopy of the pawn slip. It contained the name, address and phone numbers of the customer. The man who had pawned Quentin McKinzie’s saxophone was named Donald Teed. He lived in the Valley. Nikolai Servan had given him $200 for the instrument.

  Bosch sat down and noticed that Teed had listed his work phone number with a 323 area code and a Hollywood exchange. That might explain why a man who lived in the Valley had used a pawnshop in Hollywood. He picked up the phone and punched in Teed’s work number. It was answered immediately by a woman who said, “Splendid Age.”

  “Excuse me?” Bosch said.

  “Splendid Age Retirement Home, how can I help you?”

  “Yes, is Donald Teed a resident there?”

  “A resident? No. We have a Donald Teed who works here. Is that who you mean?”

  “I think so. Is he there?”

  “He is here today but I am not sure where he is right now. He’s a custodian and moves around. Who is calling? Is this a solicitation?”

  Bosch felt things falling into place. He decided to take a shot.

  “I’m a friend. Can you tell me if another friend of mine is there? His name is Quentin McKinzie.”

  “Yes, Mr. McKinzie is a resident here. What is this about?”

  “I’ll call back.”

  Bosch hung up the phone and his eyes drifted to the saxophone.

  Nikolai Servan opened his eyes the moment Bosch came through the door. Bosch put the piece of paper he carried down on the table and took the seat across from Servan, folding his arms and putting his elbows on the table in almost a mirror image.

  “We’ve hit a snag, Mr. Servan.”

  “A snag?”

  “A problem. Actually a few imaually aof them. And what I’d like to do here is give you the opportunity to tell me the truth this time.”

  “I don’t understand. I tol’ you truth. I tol’ you truth.”

  “I think you left some things out, Mr. Servan.”

  Servan clasped his hands together on the table and shook his head.

  “No, I tol’ everything.”

  “I’m going to advise you of your rights now, Mr. Servan. Listen closely to what I read you.”

  Bosch read Servan his rights from the paper on the table. He then turned
it around and asked the pawnbroker to sign it. He gave him the pen. Servan hesitated and seemed to slowly reread the rights waiver form all over again. He then picked up the pen and signed. Bosch asked the first question the instant the point of the pen came off the paper.

  “So what did you do with the burglar’s lock picks, Mr. Servan?”

  Servan held his lips tightly together for a long moment and then shook his head.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Sure you do, Mr. Servan. Where are the picks?”

  Servan only stared at him.

  “Okay,” Bosch said, “let’s try this one. Tell me how you wired that display case.”

  Servan bowed his head once.

  “I have attorney now,” he said. “Please, I have attorney now.”

  Bosch pulled to a stop in front of the Splendid Age Retirement Home and got out with the saxophone and its stand. He heard Christmas music drifting out of an open window. Elvis Presley singing “Blue Christmas.”

  He thought about Nikolai Servan spending Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in the Parker Center jail. It would probably be the only jail time he’d ever see.

  The District Attorney’s Office would not decide until after the holiday whether to charge him or kick him loose. And Bosch knew it would probably be the latter. Prosecuting the case against the pawnbroker was fraught with difficulties. Servan had lawyered up and stopped talking. Afternoon-long searches of his home, car, the pawnshop and the trash containers in the alley failed to produce Monty Kelman’s lock picks or the method by which the display case had been rigged to deliver the fatal charge. Even the cause of death would be difficult to prove in a court of law. Kelman’s heart had stopped beating. A burst of electricity had most likely caused ventricular fibrillation, but in court a defense lawyer could easily and most likely successfully argue that the burn marks on the victim’s hand and foot were inconclusive and possibly not even related to cause of death.

  And all of these obstacles were minor in comparison with the main difficulty—the victim was a thief killed during the commission of a crime. He had engaged in repeated offenses against the defendant. Would a jury even care that Nikolai Servan had set a fatal trap for him? Probably not, the prosecutor told Bosch and Edgar.

  Bosch planned to go back to the pawnshop the following morning. In his personal ledger, everybody counted or nobody counted. That included burglars. He would look until he found the picks or the wire Servan had used to kill Monty Kelman.