Rubout (3 page)

“Yeah!” cried three of the four judges.

The third contestant looked like a leather cheerleader. She wore a white leather skirt that was short and flippy, lace-trimmed white leather boots that were short and frilly, and a look of innocence that charmed the men and didn’t fool the women. The next woman had a leather vest and the cheeks cut out of her jeans. She wiggled her rear, to the delight of every judge but me. After that, bottoms started jiggling like Jell-O in an earthquake. “We need to look again,” cried Will, so the contestants wiggled some more, but the sight didn’t inspire me.

“Who are you picking?” asked Streak, wrapped in a cloud of cigarette smoke.

“I’m not voting this round,” I said.

“Hey, yes, you are,” Parker said gravely. “We need a woman’s view.”

I thought there were plenty of women’s views, but I peeked at the other scorecards. The judges had given the leather cheerleader high marks. I could go along with that. “Number Three,” I said.

“Good choice,” Streak said, letting out an approving puff of smoke. I was one of the guys.

Sonny presented the winner with the brass plaque to huge applause. I wondered where you hung an award like that.

“Best in Leather, Men’s Division,” Sonny announced, and a string of leather-clad guys stumbled to the front.

All three male judges said simultaneously, “I’m not judging men.”

“Yes, you are,” I said. “If I had to judge the women, you have to judge the men.”

“Fair is fair,” said Streak, and the other judges nodded and went to work.

Contestant Number One was just Busched enough that he switched his rear saucily when he paraded in his black leather chaps. “Hey!” a woman in the audience cried. “We saw the women’s butts, now what about the men’s?”

He ignored this request. So did Number Two. But contestant Number Three unbuckled his chaps, dropped his trou, and showed a really nice set of buns. They were fat free and tanned to a golden brown. There were no unsightly dimples or pimples. The women in the audience cheered his courageous move. The Catholic schoolgirl buried inside of me came out and disapproved. She knew I was going to hell for watching bikers drop their pants. The rest of me thought it was pretty funny.

Contestant Number Four was an impressive sight. He had a strong jaw, stronger shoulders, narrow hips, and sexy sun wrinkles around his blue eyes. He wore a brilliant blue jacket made of zillions of leather scales, blue jeans, and blue lizard boots. “That’s a really bad-ass jacket,” Parker said respectfully. Streak and Will agreed. In a fairer world, Number Four would have the plaque. But sex wins every time.

The women in the audience were screaming “Number Three! Number Three!” I explained the facts of life to the judges. “If you don’t vote for Number
Three, you’re dead meat.” They looked out at the beer-bottle waving audience. The people had spoken, and they were pretty drunk. Number Three won.

“Now it’s time for our Ladies in Lace!” said Sonny. This was clearly the climax of the contest. Contestant Number One was a repeat from Ladies’ Leather, the bottom-waver in chaps and a lace body stocking. The judges waved her on. Next was a woman with rippling blond hair and a ruffly sheer red gown cut to reveal red lace panties. “Yeah!” three of the judges said. They barely had time to wipe off the drool before an even more astonishing outfit paraded by—a Spandex suit cut into a spiderweb of strange and wonderful holes. She waggled her rear and the men did everything but sit up and beg.

The Spandex Wonder was followed by a woman wearing only a black-lace body suit, cut high on the thigh. It was an awesome display of smooth skin from hip to heel. “That’s the best wax job I’ve ever seen,” I said. “That woman deserves to win for the pain endurance alone. I’d need a full anesthetic to be that hairless.” The guys didn’t get it, but the women sitting near me applauded her.

Another contestant wore an animal-print outfit that was two strips of cloth over her bosom and one on the bottom. The three male judges looked dizzy, but Judge Will brought them back to duty. “Impressive,” he said, “but this is not the
Leopard
and Lace Ball.” They admired the view and crossed her off the winner’s list.

The next woman belonged on a New York fashion runway. She was tall, bone thin, and bore up an intricate arrangement of leather and lace strips that
moved every time she did. I couldn’t figure out how she kept the strategic parts covered. I had more leather on my keychain.

The final contestant wore a body stocking made of black Harley lace. Her body was covered with lacy Harley cycles. She had the generous womanly proportions that painters in another age loved.

The male judges were having a tough time deciding on a winner, and I wasn’t any help. “Let’s see them again,” they said. All the women paraded past and some waggled their rear ends, which thrilled three of the judges.

And, then to my delight, the male judges chose the handsome and generously proportioned woman. She was rejected by fashion, but these male bikers saw lightning in those thunder thighs.

“Gentlemen, I’m proud to confirm your decision,” I said.

The loser in the lace and leather chaps was not. She snarled, “You are
all
on my shit list.”

“I’m dead anyway,” Parker said, with resignation. “You eliminated the woman I’m sleeping with.”

“Correction. Used to sleep with,” Streak said. Everyone laughed but Parker.

Speaking of sleeping, it was almost two
A.M
. I was tired. I told Sonny and his wife Debbie good night, waved good-bye to the judges, found my purse and walked down the staircase. The night was still cold, but now, after the heat and cigarette smoke at the ball, it felt good. There was a light drizzle, and mist rose up from the rain-slicked streets.

Just outside the Casa Loma, I saw a buxom young woman, with pale hair like a spring dandelion. I
watched Dandelion slug a young man right in the jaw with surprising strength. Young women certainly have improved their upper body strength since I was growing up. The young man rubbed his jaw and shouted, “I said I was sorry. What else am I supposed to do?”

Dandelion didn’t answer. Head high, she walked past him to the end of the building and turned down the alley. The off-duty cop guarding the Casa Loma door shrugged but didn’t follow her. The wide alley was lit so we could see her progress. Dandelion walked past an old garage with gray wooden doors and an abandoned plaid couch. Why are couches in alleys always plaid? The young man went to the alley and stood there. “I said,” he shouted at Dandelion, “what else do you want from me?”

Silence. Dandelion had almost reached a big Dumpster, tall as an upended van.

“Answer me,” he pleaded.

She screamed. It wasn’t a scream of rage. This was sheer fright mixed with horror, as if she’d seen some hellish sight. She backed away from the Dumpster, still shrieking, ran straight to the young man, stumbled and buried her pale face in his chest. She began rocking back and forth and crying “No! No! No!” He looked bewildered. The off-duty cop knew what her behavior meant: She had seen something so horrible, she didn’t want to believe it. The cop ran down the alley toward the Dumpster, and I ran after him.

Behind the Dumpster, a woman was lying on her side. She wasn’t moving. Her blond hair was damp and oozing big clots of something that looked black. Oil? Who would smear oil in her hair? As I got
closer, I saw her hair was thick with blood, not oil. It covered her face like some exotic native mask. Her nose and cheekbone were strangely flattened. Blond hair and black blood were smeared across her eyes. Her lips looked mashed. A gold button winked in a puddle near her shoulder, and dirty gold braid trailed from one bloody wrist.

I didn’t recognize the face—not in its current condition—but I’d know that outfit anywhere. It was Sydney, very dead in her designer leather.

R
ed police lights pulsed on the Casa Loma’s walls and mist rose from the alley potholes, turning the murder scene into a hell’s parody of the biker ball. For music, we had the shriek and wail of sirens. Yellow police-line tape festooned everything like some failed festive decoration. The T-shaped alley behind the Casa Loma was blocked at all three entrances, by what seemed to be every police car, marked and unmarked, in St. Louis. There was even a hook and ladder truck. The Evidence Technician Unit arrived, and police searched the alley carefully with flashlights to make sure they didn’t miss anything before they brought in the bulky vehicle. The ETU pulled up near the murder scene. Harsh lights on the roof illuminated the alley. An evidence technician snapped Sydney’s photo from every angle, and they were all bad. Sydney had been beaten until the fragile bones in her face cracked and collapsed. I could see some of the brutal damage
even through the thick blood. I saw her small, blood-smeared hands, still trying to protect her face. Two nails were broken, but her hands were still beautiful, well tended, and useless. Like Sydney.

She’d been beaten with what looked like a motorcycle drive chain. It was artlessly draped near the shoulder of her leather jacket, as if the designer put it there for a prop. I’d just about convinced myself that the gobs of dark stuff on the chain were grease. Then I saw the clump of pretty silky blond hair, the size of a skein of embroidery thread, clinging to the drive chain. One end had a saucy curl. The other had a bloody bit of scalp.

I made it to the back of the old garage before I was sick. I managed to miss my suede boots, which were already sodden from the pothole puddles. I squatted by the garage for a bit, woozy and shaking. Actually, it was a good spot to observe things without being in the way. I could hear the crackle of police radios, see uniformed officers interviewing people in the alley, watch the brass standing around looking important and posing for the TV crews. Four unlucky cops were taking the Dumpster apart. Others had a dangerous assignment inside the Casa Loma. They had to close the bar in a roomful of one thousand bikers and then start interviewing people.

In the alley, several officers seemed awfully interested in a scrawny biker I’d danced with earlier. I thought his name was Mitch. I caught snippets of questions aimed at him: “Can you describe the person? How tall was the person?” I wanted to hear more, but then I was sick again.

When I stood up, sour-mouthed and shivering, a
man handed me his white silk handkerchief. Terrific. Homicide Detective Mark Mayhew had been watching me barf my guts out.

“Francesca, are you okay?” he asked, and he sounded like he meant it.

“I’m fine,” I lied.

“Do you want to go inside and sit down? Can I get you a drink? Have someone drive you home?”

I answered no to all his well-meant suggestions. Every time I met him, I had to remind myself that he was married. Mark was the nicest fashion plate I’d ever met. Even at 2:00
A.M
. the man was beautifully dressed. He took off his trench coat and put it around my shaking shoulders. It felt warm and smelled faintly of some spicy, manly scent. He was wearing a blue-striped silk shirt like the Perry Ellis I gave Lyle for his birthday and a gray suit so well cut it almost hid his shoulder holster.

“Nice outfit for hanging around alleys,” I said.

“So is yours,” he said. Suddenly I was very aware of my long black boots, leather pants, and dark hair, wild in the damp night. This wasn’t the way I usually dressed when I saw Mark. This was a nice outfit for an alley. It was an even better outfit for the nearby Cherokee Street Stroll, where the prostitutes paraded. He didn’t ask why I was dressed like a hooker, but I gave him an explanation anyway.

“I was at the biker ball,” I said. “As a guest. For once I didn’t have to do a column.” But now I did. I was within throwing-up distance of a major story. I should be covering it for the
Gazette.
I slipped into my reporter role. I wore it like armor. If I worked hard enough, I wouldn’t think about the other murder
I saw, years ago. I still had nightmares about the dripping blood. I knew this would be one of the bad nights with bad dreams. But I could fight them off for a while if I played reporter.

“Sydney was beaten with a bike chain, wasn’t she?” I said. I wanted Mark to confirm it. He wouldn’t.

“The autopsy will tell us for sure,” he said, a noncommittal answer.

I tried again. “Why were the uniformed officers asking Mitch to describe someone? He seemed pretty drunk. Is he a suspect?”

This time Mayhew laughed. “Mitch a suspect? No, he was upstairs in the men’s room—he pointed overhead at a square, lit window that looked out on the alley—”about twelve-ten or so, which is about ten or fifteen minutes after Sydney left the building. He says he stuck his head out for some fresh air and saw a little old lady—his words—hurrying down the alley toward Utah Street.”

“That information must be a big help,” I said sarcastically. Older women were as common as dandelions in this aging neighborhood.

“Did he get a description?”

“Yeah,” Mark said. “Mitch told us that she was ‘not too fat’ and wore what he calls ‘an old lady coat.’ He says it was maybe dark blue or black. The woman had a dark hat pulled over her hair, which was maybe gray. Or maybe white. She also carried a ‘big black old lady purse.’”