the Prostitutes' Ball (2010) (20 page)

As I stood in the back pantry of that creaking, windblown mansion, I felt just like one of those little birds.

One snap and a crunch from oblivion.

Chapter
32.

We left the large canister of Luminol inside the back door because it was too heavy to lug around, and took a slow walk through the downstairs, leaving our telltale footprints in the dust. I entered the solarium, and walked over to the curved windows to look out at the pool house, where the triple murder had occurred just days earlier. But tonight I was here to look at a completely different crime, one that had happened nearly thirty years ago.

I turned and saw a series of framed photographs on the far wall that looked like an exhibit of some kind. Hitch and I walked over and examined them. A wide framed placard above the shots said the mansion had been designated as a California landmark house in 1980. Since certification, no renovations other than standard maintenance had occurred to the historical structure. Prior to that freeze, previou
s o
wners had photographed the different stages of the home's development and those shots were displayed on the wall.

It had always been a magnificent house, but when first built, it was considerably smaller. There was a pool, but no pool house. In a photo dated 1928, a big ugly-looking concrete building with a metal door and a pitched roof was shown at the side of the house near where the trash area now was.

"What the hell is that?" Hitch said, studying the shot.

"Some kind of poured-concrete one-car garage," I said. "Kinda ugly. Musta been torn down during one of the renovations before this became a landmark house."

There were other pre-1980 renovations displayed in the photographs. The solarium was a '60s addition, as was the pool house. A second floor had been added on the east wing in '76.

Something heavy fell over and crashed upstairs.

We both froze.

"What's that?" Hitch whispered.

My heart was pounding. I could hear nothing but the Santa Anas rattling the windows and blowing the branches of a large elm into the roof on the east side of the house.

"It's nothing but the wind," I said, not exactly believing it.

Then we heard scratching.

"Rats," I said softly, under my breath.

"Rat must be on steroids," Hitch whispered. "Whatever's doing that is big."

We now heard something moving upstairs, followed by some kind of clawing, dragging sound.

"Thomas Vulcuna s ghost coining to get us?" I said, half in jest.

"Don't joke about shit like that," he hissed.

Hitch definitely seemed to be worried about a poltergeist factor. Then I remembered him saying, "I don't get along with dead people, they don't get along with me." Was it possible my new homicide partner believed in ghosts?

We listened in silence for almost a minute. When it didn't recur, I figured it was rodents. "See? Nothing," I said.

We moved cautiously into the living room, where I looked at the old, dusty Christmas tree and the twenty or so unopened presents.

"Let's see where the two Vulcuna women got killed," I said. "According to Norris and McKnight s murder book, the bodies were found over by the fireplace."

I went into the back porch area, grabbed the metal spray canister, returned to the living room, and pumped up the pressure. Then I aimed the nozzle at the fireplace area, wetting down the floor in front of the hearth.

It immediately lit up like a truck stop diner.

"Look at that," Hitch said softly.

Even though it had been a quarter century since the murders had occurred, we could see the outlines of both bodies in the Luminol's fluorescent glow. One had died over by the hearth, the other was farther out in the room, perpendicular to the fireplace. The women had bled profusely. Blood had collected around them, but not under them, leaving form impressions outlining where they fell.

"They were definitely killed in here," Hitch whispered softly, then added, "by the way, if we get Jamie to do this movie I think he should spray the Luminol."

"Yeah, you're right. Scully would be huddled over in the corner, shitting his pants."

Another clawing sound came from upstairs.

"There it is again!" Hitch whispered in fright, looking up at the ceiling.

I had to admit, it didn't quite sound like a rat. It sounded much bigger.

"I'm gonna unpack," Hitch said, pulling out his sidearm.

"This house is empty," I assured him. But because fear is even more contagious than a yawn, I pulled the Springfield from my belt holster.

"You wanta go up and check it out?" Hitch asked. "I'll cover you from down here."

"Don't you think Jamie would want the Hitchens character to man up and do the ghost check?" I whispered back.

"No," he said adamantly.

"Come on, numbnuts. Let's clear this fucking house."

We climbed the staircase. I took the lead with Hitch close behind me like a Marx brother in a forties comedy. Each stair seemed to creak louder than the last. Halfway to the landing we heard a frenzy of motion.

A lamp broke.

Glass shattered.

My heart leapt up into my throat. When I turned, Hitch was already back downstairs, standing by the front door, gun up in a shooting stance.

"If it's a ghost, that gun won't help you." I motioned for him to follow me up. "Come on, or you're not my partner anymore."

Reluctantly he rejoined me.

We finally got to the landing on the second floor. The walls were covered in some kind of old red flocked wallpaper. The floors were wood and creaked as we moved slowly and deliberately toward the master suite, where in 1981 Tom Vulcuna was supposed to have taken his life after killing his family.

As we approached the room, I had both my gun and my Mini Maglite out, pointing them at the threshold.

Then I saw a pair of yellow eyes shining brightly over by the window.

I swung the light and caught a huge raccoon in its beam.

It was the size of a fat beagle.

It screamed at us, then turned, raced along next to the floorboards, and jumped up on an old dresser, knocking a porcelain bowl over in the process before disappearing into the open heating duct.

The bowl, which was still teetering, suddenly fell and broke on the floor.

My heart was pounding even harder. Hitchs breath hissed out through his mouth.

It took us both almost a full two minutes to calm down.

"I think we should leave this out of the movie," I suggested.

"Solid," he replied.

Chapter
33.

After the raccoon vacated I went back downstairs and retrieved the canister of Luminol. Then we sprayed the bedroom.

Nothing fluoresced.

The bed linens and mattress had been removed and the box spring didn't glow. But the important fact was the headboard with the bullet hole also showed no sign of blood or CFS splatter. Neither did the wall behind it.

"Vulcuna wasn't killed in this room," I said and Hitch nodded.

I saw a color picture in a silver frame on the dresser so I walked over and picked it up.

The photo was of the Vulcuna family, done in studio by a professional photographer who had used a draped multicolor sheet a
s h
is background. They were a nice-looking family. Thomas was a handsome, middle-aged man with salt-and-pepper hair and a prominent chin. He was looking into the lens, his eyes projecting pride in his wife and daughter. Elizabeth was a fragile forty-five-year-old beauty with a long neck and wistful smile. The real looker, however, was their young daughter, Victoria. She had long dark hair and almost perfect features.

Somehow, seeing them made this cold case investigation more relevant. I now had a mental image of the family for whom I was attempting to seek justice. I carefully set the picture back down.

"I'm about ready to get out of here," Hitch whispered. "Let's go think this out in a crowded bar someplace."

"I want to open a few of those presents downstairs first."

"Why?"

" 'Cause I had a shitty Christmas and maybe I'll like something," I said sarcastically.

"I want to go now," Hitch persisted.

"And I want to see what these people were giving each other for Christmas. Norris and McKnight got pulled from this case before they could fully investigate it. That's something you know they would've done."

Hitch followed me downstairs and I started with the presents marked to Victoria from her dad. The notes inside the cards were sweet. It was obvious that Thomas Vulcuna had cherished his eighteen-year-old daughter.

One read:

Dear beautiful Victoria
,
As you grow, you make your dad prouder with each day. Nothing in my life equals the joy you have brought me.

I hope you still like this necklace. You admired it in New
York, so I snuck back and bought it for you.

Merry Christmas,

darling,

Poppie

I handed the card to Hitch, who took it and read it carefully. After he was through, he said, "This guy didn't beat his daughter to death with a damn hammer."

I didn't think so either.

There were lots of presents to his wife, Elizabeth. One box contained a flimsy negligee and a note that said:

Open after Christmas right after.

Tommy

More notes and cards to Vulcuna's wife and daughter followed. Each one was loving, all of them written in his neat, careful hand.

I looked up from my unwrapping project and saw that Hitch had gone wandering. I found him in the library looking at the Vulcunas' book collection.

"What are you doing?"

"You can tell a lot about people by looking at the books they read."

He began reciting titles. "Jacqueline Susann Valley of the Dolls, Stephen King The Stand, Jackie Collins Lovers and Gamblers. The Vulcunas were populists."

"And that's unusual?"

"Where's the Shakespeare, the Chaucer, the Beowulf? This guy chooses The Divine Comedy to leave as a suicide note, yet there's not one piece of classic literature in here."

"Good get, homes."

Then he said, "I don't want you to think I'm scared, and in the movie, Hitch would stay all night if need be, but I really think we're done here. Okay?"

"I want to check one more thing," I said. "Let's Luminal the area out back where we found the 7.65 slug. That's probably where Thomas Vulcuna was actually killed."

"We aren't going to find anything with Luminol out there," Hitch said. "It happened over twenty-five years ago. If he was killed by the side of the house, the rain and weather has long ago washed all the blood evidence away."

"What about the trash shed? It's wood. Wood is porous."

"Okay," he sighed reluctantly.

We backed out of the house, relocked the padlock, and headed around the side to the trash area.

The wooden shed had an overhanging roof covering two new Dumpsters. I went inside and sprayed the area. The low glow of blood suddenly fluoresced everywhere. It was much fainter on the walls of the trash shed than it was in the living room, because, as Hitch said, over the years, weather had diluted the blood. But it had seeped into the wood out here in '81 and had managed to remain for the intervening quarter century.

"This is where Vulcuna got it," Hitch stated.

As we were leaving, I walked around the side of the trash area and caught a glint of something metal in the beam of my flashlight coming from behind the holly bushes that were planted there. I pushed the thorny growth aside, carefully threading my arm through the brambles. About two feet in, I touched cold metal.

"There's something back here," I called softly to Hitch. "Get the leaf strainer pole. It's lying by the side of the pool house."

A minute later Hitch came back with the long-handled pool net. I turned it around and poked the pole's handle into the holly bush.

Something very large and metallic was hiding back there. I probed several other spots and hit the same metal object.

"What the hell?" Hitch said.

"Lets cut these bushes back," I suggested.

We went in search of the gardeners shed, which was on the north side of the house in the back. The door was locked, but I had it open in a minute with my trusty set of picks.

Inside we found some long-handled hedge clippers and gloves. We returned to the trash area and began cutting away the holly bush. It took us almost half an hour.

When we finally had it cut back, we were looking at an anodized metal door that had been painted silver. It was on the front of a poured-concrete building the size of a one-car garage.

I realized that this was the structure we'd seen in the old photos hanging in the solarium. There was a raised metal plate on the locked door and I leaned forward to read it in the dim light. It said: