The Murder Book

Garvey Jr. and Bob Cossack began making the papers by their midtwenties- just a few years after the Ingalls murder. Senior had keeled over on the seventh hole of the Wilshire Country Club golf course, and the reins of Cossack Development passed to the sons. They'd diversified almost immediately, continuing ongoing construction projects but also bankrolling a slew of independent foreign films, none of which made money.

Calendar shots showed the Cossack brothers attending premieres, sunning in Cannes, venturing to Park City for the Sundance Festival, eating hip-for-a-nanosecond cuisine, hanging out with starlets and fashion photographers, addicted heirs, people famous for being famous, the usual assortment of Hollywood leeches.

Garvey Cossack Jr. seemed to love the camera- his face was always closest to the lens. But if he thought himself photogenic, that was more than a bit of delusion. The visage he flaunted was squat, porcine, topped by thinning, curly, light brown hair and anchored by a squishy dinner roll of a neck that propped up the sphere of cranium like an adipose brace. Younger brother Bob ('Bobo' because as a kid he'd loved the wrestler Bobo Brazil) was also coarse-featured, but thinner than his brother, with long, dark hair combed straight back from a low, square brow and a Frank Zappa mustache that diminished his chin. Both brothers favored the black suit-and-T-shirt combo, but it came across as costumery. Nothing fit Garvey right, and Bobo looked as if he'd shoplifted his threads. These countenances were meant for the back room, not the klieg lights.

The Cossack brothers' big-screen adventures appeared to last for three years, then they shifted gears and began making noises about bringing a football team to the Coliseum. Resurrecting one of their father's unfulfilled dreams. Assembling a 'consortium' of financial types, the brothers submitted a proposal to the city council that ended up being denounced by the more populist members as a scheme to lock in taxpayer financing of their for- profit plan.

The sports venture fizzled as had the movie game, and for a couple years, the Cossacks were out of print. Then Garvey Cossack resurfaced with plans for a federally funded community redevelopment project in the San Fernando Valley, and Bobo garnered attention for attempting to demolish a Hollywood bowling alley that the locals wanted preserved as a landmark in order to put up a giant strip mall.

Their mother's obituary was dated three years ago. Ilse Cossack had died '…after a long battle with Alzheimer's disease… private services, in lieu of flowers, donations to…'

Still no mention of Sister Caroline.

I began scanning the Web and the periodicals files for accounts of sexual homicides taking place within five years of Janie Ingalls's murder, found nothing dramatically similar. Interesting, because sexual sadists don't quit voluntarily, so maybe Janie's murderer was dead or imprisoned. If so, would Milo ever get the answers he wanted?

I went downstairs to the Public Affairs Room, got my hands on every back issue of the FBI Law Enforcement Journal I could find, along with stacks of forensic magazines and crime periodicals. Because the savagery of what had been done to Janie was notable and perhaps the wound pattern- scalping in particular- had repeated itself.

But if it had, I couldn't find the evidence. The FBI magazine had veered away from VICAP alerts and detailed crime studies to bland cop-speak articles geared for public relations, and the only case report involving removal of cranial skin cropped up in a wire service piece on crime in Brazil: A German-born doctor, son of a Nazi immigrant, had murdered several prostitutes and kept their scalps as trophies. The man was in his late twenties- a toddler at the time of the Ingalls case. Everyone starts off as a cute little baby.

Maybe Janie's murderer had continued to pursue his grisly interests without leaving any bodies behind.

But that didn't make sense. He'd flaunted Janie's corpse twenty years ago and was likely to get more, not less, brazen.

When I got home, my message machine registered zero calls. I phoned Milo's house and Rick Silverman answered, sounding sleepy. He's an ER surgeon. No matter when I call, I seem to be waking him up.

'Alex. How's it going?' He sounded casual. So Milo hadn't told him about Robin.

'Fine, and with you?'

'I'm working, they're paying me, I'm not complaining.'

'You're the only doctor who isn't.'

He laughed. 'Actually, I'm bitching plenty, but too much of that, and you get bored with yourself. I keep telling myself it's a good thing I'm salaried, don't have to deal with the HMOs directly. Maybe one day Milo'll pay all the bills.'

'That'll be the year he heads to Paris for the big couture shows.'

He laughed again but I was thinking: Paris? Where did that come from, Professor Freud?

'So you're busy,' I said.

'Just came off an eighteen-hour fun-fest. Multicar collision. Daddy and Mommy having a spat in front, two kids in the back, three and five, no car seats, no belts. Daddy and Mommy survived. She may even walk again- enough of this or I'll have to pay you. The big guy's not in. Breezed by for dinner, then left.'

'He say where he was going?'

'Nope. We had Chinese takeout and I nearly fell asleep in my moo goo. When I woke, he'd tucked me in and left a note saying he might be busy for a while. He did seem a little edgy. Is there something I should know about? You two into something new?'

'No,' I said. 'Everything's old.'

I tried reading, watching TV, listening to music, meditating- what a joke that was, all I could focus on was bad stuff. By 10 P.M. I was ready to claw the plaster from the walls and wondering when Robin would call again.

At this hour, the Eugene concert would be in full force and she'd be backstage, wonderfully harried. Needed. All those guitar-strumming, save-the-world sonofabitch-

Rrrrring.

My 'hello' was breathless.

'What, you in the middle of working out?' said Milo.

'I'm in the middle of nothing. What's up?'

'I can't locate Schwinn, but I might've found his old lady.'

'First name Marge? Mecca Ranch in Oak View?' I said.

His exhalation was a protracted hiss. 'Well, well, well, someone's been a busy worker bee.'

'More like a drone. How'd you find her?'

'Exemplary detective work,' he said. 'I got hold of Schwinn's retirement file- a naughty thing, so this stays between you and me.'

'His pension checks went to the ranch?'

'For the first fifteen years after he left, they went to an address in Simi Valley. Then he switched to a post- office box in Oxnard for two years, then the ranch. He's not listed in any DMV files, but the address cross-referenced to Marge Schwinn. I just called her, got a machine, left a message.'

'No DMV listing for him,' I said. 'Think he's dead?'

'Or he doesn't drive anymore.'

'An ex-cop who doesn't drive?'

'Yeah,' he said. 'True.'

'Suburban life in Simi followed by a two-year POB interlude before the ranch. That could be divorce, intervening lonely bachelorhood, remarriage.'

'Or widowhood. His first wife was named Dorothy and she stopped being a beneficiary when he moved to Oxnard. Two years later, Marge came on.' He paused. 'Dorothy… I think he mentioned her name. It's getting hard to tell what I remember and what's wishful thinking. Anyway, that's it, for now.'

I recounted my time in the library, what I'd learned about the Cossacks.

'Rich kids stay rich,' he said. 'Big surprise. I also looked for Melinda Waters. She's on no state files, and neither is her mother, Eileen. That may not mean much if she got married and/or Mom got remarried and they both changed their names. I wish I knew the name of Melinda's Navy dad, but I never learned it. The guy had shipped out to Turkey, good luck tracing that. I did locate Bowie Ingalls, and he's definitely dead. Nineteen years dead.'