Gumshoe #9

So, yeah. I did not forget about this.
"So, you're stopping?" Bruce was pretty upset. As we sat in the tenderloin place on Army Post Rd--the only place he eats other than his home--I could tell he was upset. We'd barely ordered when he started in on asking about the case. I hadn't really felt like talking about it. In the two days since I came to next to Chance's body--complete with a new body piercing in his chest--I had been pretty busy, but a lot of that busy was trying to not attract attention.
"I'm not stopping." I tried to calm him, but I knew it would not work. Bruce calls himself a "libratarian", but his interpretation of that way of thinking is--let's say--a lot more paranoid than others who might self-apply that label. One of the side effects of Bruce's brand of "libratarianism" is that he thinks that people are always out to get him. People with power. People with nothing better to do. People who don't rest. And if these people were out to get him, it only stood to reason that they were out to get everyone else as well.
"It's been two days," I said quietly as the waitress set down the tenderloins. I pegged her age at around 40, but it was hard to say because she was obviously someone who had lived pretty hard in her younger days. The kind of living that she probably regrets now. The kind of living I regret in my own experience.
"Two days. Might as well be two months," he said forcing the wad of french fries down his throat. "There's a killer out to get you."
"Yeah," I said with a shrug.
"So? What are you doing?"
"I'm keeping in contact with Edna and the cops. I was just down there today, but--"
"Yeah. The cops will surely get to this. It's not like they've been trying to pin all this on you."
"I think being found tied up in the room with the corpse of someone who was at-least and accomplice has cleared my name."
"That was the corpse of a cop. And they'll find a way to close that case one way or the other. If that means you go down..."
Bruce was probably right. I was probably still the best suspect the police had. Especially with the desperation to solve a case that comes in the killing of a cop--even one who was dirty--I couldn't count on the someone coming up with some ridiculous theory where I killed Chance and tied myself up. Or that I had a partner tie me up. Or that I was double-jointed and had three hands. Des Moines doesn't get as harsh a look as other cities when it comes to the honesty of our police force. And mostly that is for good reason. But there are secrets in this city that are hidden from the street light's glare.
"Bruce," I said interupting him, "what do you remember about that mess with that Princess from South of Grand back about 10 years ago?"
He shrugged. "This is what you want to talk about? Ancient history?"
"Mary Claire Parsons-Kitt. Iowa royalty, or as close as we come to it. Until she was murdered by her husband." I said quietly. "Didn't she have a kid. A boy?"
"Yeah. Maybe she did." He said with growing confusion.
I reached into the bag sitting beside me and pulled out a police personell file. "Yes. She did. His name was Chadwick G. Parsons. Seems as though he was a model kid. Did well in highschool and was prom king. Was halfway through college at Simpson College in Indianola, doing very well, when the whole mess with her murder went down. Seemed to throw his life off track until young Chadwick enrolled himself into the police academy and seemingly devoted himself to truth, justice and tracking down bad-guys. Of course, he'd changed his name to Chance Greer, probably to avoid the publicity of all that stuff."
Bruce smiled at me. "How do you know?"
"When I was down at the police station today, I thought I might use that opportunity to do a little research." I said smirking at him. "I appreciate the pep-talk, but I called you here more to see if you could run some names for me."
"What names?" He said, taking a thick sip from his strawberry shake.
"Well, I did a little digging. According to the gossip columns of the time, he didn't get along with his step-siblings, so he took his share of the estate and stayed in Indianola. So, I'm thinking, what does Indianola have to do with anything?"
"And?"
"And the key to this whole thing is the last victim. Whoever this guy is, he keeps refrencing the last murder in Aaron Master's career. The Meatloaf. The style of the killing. It's all about that last guy. Geoffrey Franks. A single father from Indianola."
"So you want me to?" As I looked at Bruce, I saw something out of the corner of my eye.
"Run down these names. Friends, family and business associates who might all be more than a little miffed at a cop who quit a case just before Mr. Franks was taken." There was a man sitting at the counter reading a newspaper. At first I didn't know what it was that caught my eye. The man was no one I recognized. Just another gu living on the South Side of Des Moines, coming in here to get a good bit of unhealthy food before he went out to his day.
"So, you think that's the motive?"
"That's my guess." The newspaper crinkled in his hand as he turned to the next section and that's when I saw something that made me smile.
"You got any front-runners?"
"No. I was thinking it would be Frank's kid, so I checked on that, but she's been in New York for the past 15 years living with an aunt. So. It's up in the air."
"Okay, then why the big smile?" Bruce said. "You aren't having a stroke are you?"
"No. I think I just found an old friend. An old friend who I'm going to go punch in the face." I dropped twenty bucks on the table to cover lunch and said good-bye to Bruce.