style="font-size:15px;"> “You never know who’s next.”
Marvia reached into a jacket pocket and laid out her victim cards. “What do you make of these?”
The curtains parted and Star Lotus stuck her head into the back room. Mistress Moonflower hissed, “Stay out there. Wait on customers. Make yourself useful.”
Star Lotus withdrew.
“Look, we were hit, Officer. I mean, Woodstock West was hit. I don’t know if the Tallyman did it, or somebody else, but we need protection from the police, not harassment.”
“I know, Jimi Hendrix’s guitar. Totally burned, beyond repair.”
“It was a holy relic. If we could only recover it.…”
“Right. It’s practically the Shroud of Turin. Look, I want you to look at these cards and photos and tell me if you knew any of these people.”
Mistress Moonflower looked at the cards and the photos. She looked up at Marvia and shrugged. “Sure, I knew them.”
“All of them?”
“They were all Telly regulars. Panhandlers, street people. Sometimes they’d come into the store and demand money. Sometimes they’d want to use the back room. I never let them. When they pestered my customers I’d shoo them out. Call the cops if I had to. Lot of help that was, they always knew how long it would take the fuzz to arrive and split just in the nick of time.”
The fuzz, Marvia thought. Marvia Plum, Sergeant Fuzz.
“Who killed them?”
“They’re all dead, aren’t they?”
“Who killed them?”
“How the hell should I know? The Tallyman did it.”
“Who’s the Tallyman?”
Mistress Moonflower shrugged. One breast popped halfway out of her shirt. She said, “Oops,” and readjusted herself.
Marvia Plum started for the curtain that would bring her back into the storefront. She could hear customers talking with Star Lotus. It sounded as if Star Lotus was making a big sale. Marvia stopped and inquired, “I’m curious, Myrna. How’s business lately?”
Mistress Moonflower shrugged a little more carefully. “’Bout the same as ever.”
“Tallyman isn’t scaring your customers off, then?”
“’Bout the same as ever.”
Marvia crossed Telegraph and headed down the block toward People’s Park. She strolled along the sidewalk, not entering the park. She turned back toward the campus and stood in front of a sorority house. In five minutes one of her park snitches showed up.
“I saw you walk past the park. I could use a little bread.”
Lawsamarcy! Use a little bread. “What do you have for me?”
“I don’t know. Ask me a question.”
“Who’s the Tallyman?”
The snitch was wearing a ragged tube-top and sweat pants. Between them, her belly showed. It was smudged with ordinary dirt and a little of what seemed to be dried mustard. She wore a navel-ring from which a silver chain and crucifix dangled over the top of her pants. She said, “Don’t ask me that.”
“You followed me, Vangie.”
“I know. Ask me something else.”
“What do you know about Latonia Jones?”
Despite the bright sunlight, Vangie shivered. “A lot of people didn’t like her. She worked for some crack dealers. They’d show up generally around dusk, you know, when we get our campfires started, and she’d play lookout for them. In case the pigs were coming. Pardon me, Sergeant.”
“Yeah. Why didn’t they like her?”
“You know.” Vangie twisted her torso and flung her hair off her face. Marvia jerked away.
“I don’t know. That’s why I asked you.”
“You know. Uh, well, you know, there are some moms in the park. They don’t want their brats getting hooked. You know, Latonia kind of, well, recruited. Users, hookers. Sometimes guys come by the park in cars, especially at night. They like little kids, girls or boys.”
“Vangie, who killed Latonia?”
“I dunno. The Tallyman. Can I have some bread?”
“You’ll have to do better than that. You haven’t given me anything I don’t already know.” Marvia Plum turned away and started toward the UC campus.
She felt Vangie’s hand on her shoulder. She wasn’t surprised. “Somebody saw Latonia just before—before. It was just about sundown. Some big car pulled up by the park. She went over. I saw her lean in, then come out with something.”
“Come on, Vangie. Something—what?”
“I don’t know. I guess it was a needle.”
“And she shot up and died. And somebody stole the needle and used it again, probably.” Almost certainly. The needle had never been found. But there were no more strychnine deaths, so whoever took it had apparently had the brains to rinse it out, at least.
“What kind of car?”
“Big. Foreign. I don’t know.”
“What color was it?”
“White.”
“Japanese? German? American?”
“I don’t know. One of those English cars, I think.”
“A Rolls?”
“No. I think they call it a Jagger or something.”
“Who was driving?”
“I couldn’t see.”
“Try and remember something. Man or woman?”
“I don’t know.” Marvia turned away. Again, the hand. “A woman.”
“Age? Black or white?”
“No age, any age. White.”
“That’s all? What next?”
“She drove away, that’s all. I didn’t follow her, for God’s sake.”
Marvia Plum handed her a folded bill and Vangie trotted away, back toward the park.
Marvia headed for City Hall. She found Councilmember Hanson in her office.
“I
