CHARLEMAGNE’S WILL Chapter One
by K’lakokum
Detective Mo Singh did not like being called a Paki.
Even though he used that word himself; used it often, in fact, to refer to all those immigrants who refused to consciously study all the nuances of the language of their adopted country. It was always little things that turned brief inter-cultural exchanges into full-blown racism. Starting a sentence with the words give me, for example. Canadians considered that to be very rude. Of course, as soon as he had flashed his badge, the building superintendant had apologized, had become effusively helpful, had become that typical and average citizen who still respects a law enforcement officer at work.
Detective Singh was six feet three inches tall and he weighed two hundred eleven pounds when he stepped from his shower onto the bathroom scales. He had the brawn of the heavyweight fighter but also the elusive grace of a dancer. His brown eyes, brown beard, brown skin and large hooked nose were framed by a royal blue turban which matched precisely the shade of his suit. He wore the regulation .38 in a shoulder holster under his jacket.
The man lying on the floor at his feet was white. And dead.
He was wearing designer jeans, a classique short-sleeved shirt with a black bio-shield sprawled through the throat, black socks, no shoes. He lay on his back. A pool of dried blood stained the carpet at the back of his head. His left hand clenched a mixer stick; near his right hand an empty glass reflected the blue light from a large aquarium. He stank.
Mo opened the sliding door to the balcony and stepped out to get some air. The coroner and the Homicide cop hadn’t arrived yet, which was just as well. Mo could never understand the regulation which made it mandatory for Homicide to check on every damn murder committed in this city, even though the case was invariably assigned back to the division answering the call. He looked down nineteen floors. His unmarked cruiser in the visitors’ parking lot seemed puny. So were all the cars in the shopping plaza to his left. He glanced at the horizon. About twenty miles away the Needle Tower dominated the downtown skyline. Two miles beyond that, Lake York glistered to the edge of his vision. He wondered how much rent premium the stiff had been paying for this view.
He was startled to hear a baby cry in the apartment.
“Shit, buddy, where were you hiding?” he said, looking into the eyes of a seal-point blue Siamese cat, the breed known for its eerie human voice. “Must be hungry because your friend here has been dead a couple of days, at least, eh? Maybe you could tell me who did him in?” Should be cat food somewhere in the kitchen, he thought, going there.
He found a bag of dry cat food in a cupboard, and filled the cat’s food dispenser. It had probably not gone hungry long because the dispenser was equipped to hold about a five-day supply. He filled the cat’s water dish, then went to the door to admit the police photographer and the coroner.
Sylvester Pecota, the photographer, and Dr. Kris Kruse, the coroner, had met more than a decade ere they began working for the City. Kris had been Sylvester’s first Page Three Girl published in The Daily Planet when he began free-lancing. They had both put themselves through college by working nights as 1419 off-line sort operators for the Richmond Bank. This excruciatingly boring job involved feeding machines which processed over 2000 cheques per minute. Operators were paid for a full eight-hour shift, but could go home as soon as all cheques were sorted. Sylvester and Kris had usually worked less than four hours, leaving plenty of time for studying and double-dating. They ended up getting married to Ukrainian twins, Taras and Taria, retaining a close friendship as in-laws, and now they had adjacent offices in the basement of 22 Division.
They worked so efficiently together that they were in the apartment less than five minutes.
“Single shot, instant death, pretty straightforward, Mo; didn’t need me for this”, said Kris, “but them’s the rules. They can bring in the corpse for autopsy as soon as Homicide is done. I’d say death was about three days ago; I’ll have the report for you tomorrow. How’s Jeet doing? Are you ready, Syl?”
They both answered her at once. Syl was ready; Mo’s wife Jeet had finished her physiotherapy.
Homicide walked in. “What’s the verdict, Doc?”
“The coroner’s verdict will state death by homicide, Bert. The death certificate will have the medical description after I do the autopsy. A single shot in the back of the head, close range; bullet is still in there, instant death. Time of death around 8 pm Wednesday, subject to confirmation at autopsy. Anything else you need, Bert?”
“Thanks, Kris. Send the bullet to ballistics, and I’ll call if there’s anything else.”
Mo was standing in front of the aquarium. It was a 120 gallon tank, much bigger than his own. Acanthurus leucosternon and Zebrasoma flavescens, he thought, powder-blue and yellow tangs. Very nice. Healthy specimens. Probably hungry, too, though. There was a can of sera granumix on top of the tank. He fed the tangs.
“You fattening up my dinner, Mo?” asked Bert. “You don’t eat any fish with your curry, do you?”
Mo ignored the racism. “Maybe you should take a quick look at the victim, Bert, so we can get the stinking corpse out of here and get to work.”
“Who reported the crime?”
“The ex-wife called in a missing person. He usually takes his kid out for dinner Wednesday. He didn’t show this week. They’ve been divorced ten years, he never missed a day with the kid before. Fridays, he picks up his other kid at college and brings him home for the week-end. Didn’t show there either. No phone calls; no e-mails. He works midnights as a dispatcher at City Taxi; last shift he worked was Tuesday; he’s off Wednesdays and Saturdays, no show for work Thursday. Worried ex came by here; the car is downstairs, but no answer at door. I got the missing person squeal; the super let me in half an hour ago, and here we are.”
“The door was locked?”
“Yes. So somebody locked it on their way out. It needs a key to lock it. No sign of forced entry; the vic let whomever in.”
“Looks like he got shot while mixing a drink for his guest.”
“Pleasant way to say thanks for the hospitality.”
“Yeah. Kris said the death was 8 pm Wednesday; you said he picks up the kid Wednesdays. Has to be earlier than 8 pm if he’s taking a school kid out to dinner? Check that. Did you let the super hang around long enough to ID the body or do we need the ex for that?”
“The super did the ID.”
“Do we know of any other next of kin ‘sides the ex and two kids?”
“Not yet.”
“Hey, let’s have some volume on that!”, pointing at the television. Mo turned around. The TV was showing a bomb scene, with emergency crews removing numerous bodies from what may have been a church. He walked to the TV. It was one of the new-fangled ones without manual controls. “Do you see the remote?”, he asked Bert.
“Yeah, here on the bar with the other drink. He musta hit the mute while talking to the perp. I guess I can turn it up myself.”
“…and there appear to be no survivors. More than one hundred members of one of Italy’s oldest families, the Venicis, were attending the wedding of Count Alfonso of Venici with Louise Papadakos, the Greek heiress. The Venicis had anticipated that this marriage would begin to restore the sagging fortune of their family. The Count’s brother, Alberto, was one of many who were forced into bankruptcy in the Roma Dome financial scandal which shook the Italian establishment last year…” the announcer intoned as the camera zoomed in on the bloody bride being loaded into one of the ambulances, red stains marring the virgin white dress.
“Christ, glad that’s not my case”, said Bert, “and I don’t want this one either since I’m still on that pervert case. You OK with handling this one?”
“I took the squeal, its my case.”
“OK. The lab for prints; interview neighbours; usual routine to find a motive and some suspects. You know the ropes. Is this building wheelchair accessible?”
“Sure, why?”
“There’s a laptop plugged into that phone over there. Get Detective Jones up here in his chair to work on that. And you’re right about the stinking corpse. I’m done here.”
Copyright © 2003, K’lakokum.
This has appeared previously in South of Tuk
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