'The kids had been murdered in different spots from where they were found. They had been redressed in new clothes. That made the forensics work tough. All had semen and lubricant in their rectums. None had defensive marks or foreign tissue under their nails. To me it means that he had gained their confidence, or at least convinced them they wouldn't be harmed. He seduced them, in a way.
'All lived in Southeast. All of them had been picked up off the street, headed to the corner market or the convenience stores in their neighborhoods. Nobody saw them disappear or get into a car. It was unusual back then for no one to see anything or come forward, the way folks used to look out for their neighbors' kids. We had a ten-thousand-dollar reward out for any information. We got a lot of bullshit calls, but nothing that led to anything real.
'Had to be a black man for those black children to get into his car. I also figured it was a person of authority. Police, military, fireman, or someone wearing a uniform of some kind. Some said it was a taxi driver offering free rides, but I didn't buy into that. City kids wouldn't have fallen for it. A police or a police wannabe would think to put new clothes on the victims, clean them up, and dump them in various locations. He'd know that would mess us up on the lab work. The wannabe angle was the one that stuck in my head.
'We canvassed friends, teachers, boyfriends and girlfriends, any potential sexual partner. I went to Saint Elizabeth's and interviewed the violent sex offenders they had there at the time. The criminally insane were locked up tight, so they couldn't have perpetrated those murders, but I interviewed them as well. Zombies on meds is all they were. So there was nothing there.
'I caught the first murder. Me and this white homicide police, Chip Rogers, who I considered to be my partner at the time. Chip's now deceased. After the second body they added a few other investigators. Finally, after the third and all the newspaper articles, the mayor ordered a force of twelve detectives, exclusively, to focus on the deaths. I was in charge of the detail. We shot miles of film at those kids' funerals, hoping the killer would post. We stationed squad cars at all the community gardens in the District, around the clock. I'd park my own car near those gardens some nights and just sit there, waiting.
'Some folks in the community said we weren't working the murders as hard as we would have if the victims had been white. I can't lie; that hurt me deep. Everything I went through, coming up in the ranks as a black man. First I wasn't smart enough to be police, then I wasn't seasoned enough to work Homicide. Not to mention, my own little girl was about the same age as those kids in nineteen eighty-five. You think didn't wear on me? Funny thing was, if you looked at the closure rates of black and white victims in the city at the time, they were exactly the same. We worked all the cases hard. We worked them all the same way.
'And then the Palindrome Murders just stopped. Some say the killer got sick and died or was killed hisself. Could be he went to prison on other charges. I don't know. But I'll tell you this: I still think about it, every goddamn day.'
'I didn't mean to offend you,' said Holiday.
Cook fixed his eyes on Holiday's. 'Why are you here?'
'First thing I ought to tell you is, I didn't retire from the MPD.'
'Figured that. You're too young.'
'I resigned. Internal Affairs was investigating me on some bullshit allegations, and I walked.'
'You sayin you were true blue?'
'No. But I was good police. I'd love to turn up something on this Asa Johnson thing and shove it up the MPD's ass.'
'Passion's good.'
'I have that.'
'Let me see your identification,' said Cook.
Holiday showed Cook his driver's license. Cook went to an answering machine on his desk, hit the 'memo' button, and recorded a message. 'This is T.C. Cook. I'm headed out with a Daniel Holiday, former MPD officer, for a look at the residence of Reginald Wilson.' Cook hit the stop button. 'It would take me forever to write it, and sometimes I can't read what I wrote. Just leaving a record of my whereabouts, is all.'
Cook reached into a drawer, pulled out a micro-cassette recorder, and handed it to Holiday. He then extracted a holstered.38 Special from the same drawer and clipped it on the right side of his belt.
'I got a license; don't worry about that.'
'I'm not sayin a word,' said Holiday. 'I got a piece myself, out in the car. And I don't have a license. I'd rather have a gun and get popped for it than not have one and need it.'
'Hard habit to break when you been carrying one for so long.'
'Where we going?' said Holiday.
'Has to do with that green pin on the map.'
On the way out the door, Cook grabbed a faded light brown Stetson with a chocolate band holding a multicolored feather, and put it on his head.
'You can drive, Dan.'
'Call me Doc,' said Holiday.
CHAPTER 18
Rhonda Willis phoned the Twilight, a titty bar on New York Avenue, and asked to speak to the day bouncer working the door. Officially, the MPD no longer allowed its men and women to moonlight at such establishments, but many still did. The Twilight, with a history of shootings in its parking lot and cuttings inside the walls, used off-duty cops to pat down customers as they came through the entrance, as the sight of a badge on a chain was a deterrent to objection. A certain kind of police, the kind who liked action and fun, was naturally drawn to work that particular bar. The Twilight had the best dancers and music, and the most raucous crowd in town.
'Hey, Randy,' said Rhonda, speaking on her cell. 'It's Rhonda Willis, VCB.'
'Detective Willis.'
'You still down there, huh.'
Randolph Wallace was a twelve-year veteran, still in uniform, married with two children. Home life bored him, and he avoided it. Instead, when he wasn't on the MPD clock, he worked a few shifts a week at the Twilight. He drank free and sometimes had relations with the club's dancers.
'Yeah, you know,' said Wallace.
'I need an address on a dancer you got named Star. She stays with a girl name of Darcia. Cell number, too, if you can.'
Wallace said nothing.
'It's in connection with a murder investigation,' said Rhonda.
'This ain't really right,' said Wallace. 'I got to work with these people, Detective.'
'What, you want me and my partner to come down there and get it?' said Rhonda with a small laugh, just to keep things friendly. 'Wonder how much cocaine and smoke is trading hands in those bathrooms as we speak. All that sex for money, too. We could get the folks in Morals involved, that's what you want.'
'Detective-'
'I'll hold on while you get that for me.'
A few minutes later, Rhonda had the address and cell number for Shaylene Vaughn, whose stage name was Star, and the full name of Darcia Johnson and the number of her cell.
'Thank you, Randy. Be safe.' Rhonda ended the call.
'Did you just threaten a fellow police officer?' said Ramone.
'He doesn't need me to hurt him,' said Rhonda. 'He gonna fuck up his marriage and his career his own self, working in that place. I just don't know what people are thinking sometimes.'
They were parked near Barney Circle. Rhonda got onto the Sousa Bridge and drove over the Anacostia River into Far Southeast.
The address provided by Randolph Wallace was on the 1600 block of W Street, near Galon Terrace. Ramone and Rhonda Willis parked and walked by neighborhood kids on their bikes and young women sitting on concrete steps, holding babies and talking. Some teenage males and men in their twenties slowly drifted as the two police officers got out of their car. Ramone walked by a young man wearing a black 'Stop Snitchin' T-shirt who was holding the hand of a little boy. The shirts, popular in the D.C. area and in Baltimore, were an explicit warning to those citizens who were thinking of giving information to police.