My Dark Places - James Ellroy [78]
She was wrapped in a U.S. flag and some baby blankets. The bundle was cinched with electrical cord. The blankets were soaked in gasoline or a similar noxious accelerant. She looked like she took some bludgeon shots to the head.
Stoner walked the area. He saw no footprints, no tire tracks and no discarded bludgeon tools. The area was hilly and brush-covered. The killer probably carried the body up from a nearby access road.
A coroner’s team arrived. They went through the victim’s scorched clothing.
They found no identification. Stoner found a gold chain necklace. It looked like a peace sign or some kind of weird-ass symbol.
Stoner bagged it. The coroner’s team removed the body.
Stoner drove to the Hall of Justice and checked recent missing persons reports. Nothing matched his Jane Doe. He put out a teletype. It stressed the victim’s necklace and said she might be mentally retarded. He called the Information Bureau and told them to put out the word on Jane.
Channel 7 News ran a TV spot that night. Stoner got a call a few minutes later.
A man said he made the necklace. The pendant was an AA symbol. He sold the necklaces at AA meetings in Long Beach.
Stoner drew a picture of the necklace and wrote up the facts on his case beneath it. He added his name and number at Sheriffs Homicide. He mimeographed a hundred copies and distributed them at every AA meeting in the Long Beach area.
A man named Neil Silberschlog saw the flyers and called him. He said the victim sounded like an old AA girl. She was known as Daisie Mae. She was running with a young guy named Ronald Bacon. Silberschlog lived near Bacon. Bacon was driving Daisie Mae’s ’64 Impala. Daisie Mae was nowhere around. Silberschlog thought the deal was hinky.
Stoner drove to Long Beach and met the informant. Silberschlog ID’d a morgue photo of the victim. He said she wasn’t retarded. She was just a crusty old drunk.
Daisie Mae lived nearby. Silberschlog walked Stoner down to her pad.
It was a dive. An old drunk named One-Eyed Betty was crashed out in the front room. Betty said she saw Daisie Mae’s car in front of Ronnie Bacon’s place. Ronnie had Daisie Mae’s watch. He changed the strap and gave it to his 16-year-old girlfriend. Ronnie just got popped for burglarizing a drugstore. He was in the Main L.A. County Jail.
Stoner drove to the jail and interviewed Ronald Bacon. He was 25 years old and stone white trash. He said he went to AA for friendship. He knew Daisie Mae—but he sure didn’t kill her.
Stoner drove back to Long Beach. He searched Bacon’s pad and found an empty gas can. A neighbor said Bacon sold him a blood-soaked couch.
Stoner talked to One-Eyed Betty again. She recounted Daisie Mae’s last day on earth.
Daisie Mae just got her welfare check. She wanted to buy a TV set. One-Eyed Betty and Ronald Bacon wanted to help her spend her money. They drove her around looking for cheap TVs.
They were in Daisie Mae’s car. Bacon made Daisie Mae cash her welfare check. One-Eyed Betty went home. Bacon and Daisie Mae drove off alone.
Stoner requested a warrant on Ronald Bacon. A deputy DA heard him out and filed homicide charges. Bacon was held to answer for one count of murder one.
A woman called Stoner at the Bureau. She told him her daughter used to date Ronald Bacon. Bacon wrote her daughter a very suspicious letter.
The tone was sniveling. Bacon said he just stole some money and was “here in the car with her.” He beat an old woman to death. He started grubbing for sympathy before he torched her body.
A handwriting expert examined the letter and confirmed that Ronald Bacon wrote it. Bacon was tried, convicted and sentenced to life in prison with a no-parole stipulation. Stoner solved his first murder. He learned that men killed women and ran to other women in self-pity.
A Norwalk man shot his wife. He aimed above her head and caught her right between the eyes. The man was just letting off steam. He stashed his marijuana plants before he reported the incident. Stoner popped him for murder two. He learned that men killed women out of boredom.