The Artist of Death - Chapter 18

The Artist of Death – Chapter 18

"What do ya mean ya can't do anymore?"
"Mrs. Lenning," said Fossick wearily, casting a glance around the trash laden living room, and trying hard not to show outwards signs of his disgust at the musty, stale beer odors that wafted up his nose. Gingerly he sat down on the sofa, "please look at it from our perspective. You can't give us her real name, now that we have for a surety ascertained that Amy isn't her real name . . ."
"I told ya, didn't I?” she interrupted, “I didn't know that Amy wasn't 'er real name."
". . . and you haven't got any photographs of her. In point of fact you have given us very little if anything at all to go on. So there's really not much that we can do, is there."
Gloria Lenning rolled her eyes. "Gawd, for fuck sakes, there must be something yer can do, surely," she said raising her voice.
"Mrs. Lenning," Fossick tried again, "all we can do at present, is treat him as a missing person. Something may have happened that prompted him to seek refuge some place else . . ."
"Like wot, for instance?" she snapped.
Fossick shook his head, "You knew him better than I Mrs. Lenning, you tell me?"
"If I knew that you useless turd, I wouldn't need you would I?”
Rick Fossick had had conversations like this more times than he cared to think. People go missing, family members, who for whatever reason, disappear and those left behind do anything and everything to try to find them. Oftentimes those who leave do so for a reason. The particular situation that they were in or maybe they just got sick of living with those they were living with. He threw Gloria a glance and saw her glaring back at him with a look of utter contempt. Whatever the cause, people left and sometimes it was very difficult to find them and when they did, they’d only find that they didn’t want to go back. In a case like this, Fossick surmised, Troy Lenning could so easily come back, breezing in through the door at any second. Given the type of lifestyle the man lived and some of the obvious shady dealings that he was clearly involved in and the people has associated with, anything was possible.
Fossick broke his pause and tried another avenue. “Mrs. Lenning. We have very little information to go on at this point in time. Look at the facts. We have you’re son, who has no job, gets his money from who knows where, drives around town in a rattling old car doing who knows what, where and with whom. Add to that he had an American girlfriend who worked at a strip bar and brothel and, for obvious reasons refused to use her real name who now seems to have vanished herself, it really is very hard to trace these people. If we had this young woman’s real name and maybe even a picture, then,” he said jabbing his finger into the air directed towards her, “we would have something concrete evidence to go on. As it is, we have squat.” Now,” he said fixing his gaze straight at her, “you tell me what we’re supposed to do. Give me a crumb, anything to go on and we might be able to help.”
Gloria Lenning stared blankly at the detective and said nothing.
“You’ve said yourself,” he said continuing, “that you have no idea where he might have gone. It could be anywhere. You don’t know what he was doing. Really Mrs. Lenning, it is next to impossible for us to do anything based on what we have, which is a big fat zero.”
Gloria Lenning had stopped listening. “Listen to me,” she snapped. “His car is in the fuckin’ driveway, ‘is wallet is here at the house. Doesn’t that look suspicious to you?”
Rick Fossick nodded. “On the surface, yes it does . . .”
“Whadaya mean, on the surface. What are ya now, a fuckin’ submarine?” Her face turned grim. “What if he’s been murdered?” she spat. “Huh! What if that Yankee bitch has done him in, then what?”
Fossick took a deep breath, collecting his thoughts. “What I meant by that was, Mrs. Lenning, that those two facts do make one think that something might be wrong but we can’t be sure, not yet anyway. He could have arrived back here and someone else could have been here waiting for him or maybe arrived soon after he did. He could have left with them. In a hurry, yes, because, as you pointed out, he has left his wallet here. So we can surmise, thus far that he wasn’t attacked and robbed.”
“’Ow do ya know that?”
“If he were robbed his wallet would have gone missing. These day’s people want more than just money. They want identities. A lot more can be done by stealing peoples identities. It is very hard to catch someone when the people you are after are using an assumed name. Usually they use it just the once, maybe twice and then they dump the things they have used and moved on. This is after they have fraudulently obtained thousands of dollars of merchandise.” Fossick took a deep breath. “Anyway, getting back to the point of why we are here. We don’t have any clue yet as to whether your son is in danger or not. We have no proof.” He let his gaze sweep around the room. “Let’s be honest Mrs. Lenning it’s next to impossible to tell when there was a fight here in this house or not, really how could anyone ever tell? The only real lead we have is the girlfriend but we now know that she was not using her real name. If we had that, then we might be able to do something more. As it is, it now seems that she too has gone missing, not turning up for work the past few nights. Maybe the two of them left together, gone someplace, which might explain why he left his wallet and car here. She could have assured him that they were okay for money.” He shrugged.
Fossick stopped talking and looked hard at the disheveled woman close to him. Inside he wondered why people let themselves get into this position. They let themselves sink so low that they have no possible hope of ever getting back out of the situation that they now find themselves in. Conversely, this type of life maybe was just what these people like her want. It requires little or no effort on her part to improve because they don’t want to. They’re happy with things just the way they are.
“Do you see what I am getting at?” he asked her directly.
She nodded. “Yeah, I see. I see that’ll you’re nothing but a bunch of useless assholes who can’t be bothered with our kind of people. All you’re gonna do is go away and forget about me and my boy because we don’t matter. You can’t be bothered tryin’ to find out nothing. I see exactly what’s going on here.”
He’d given up trying to reason with her. "We'll keep in touch Mrs. Lenning and let you know if anything turns up." He paused briefly and added, “If your son should come home you will let us know, won’t you.”
Fossick rose to his feet adjusted his tie and turned away and made for the door. Kember who had been silent, listening and watching the entire time followed.
"Yeah, and bollocks to you too." she snapped angrily.
Fossick rounded on her and took a step closer to her. “Listen to me Mrs. Lenning and listen real hard.” His eyes bore down on her. “There could be any one of a dozen reasons why your son is not at home right now.” His tone became angry and firm. “Given your son’s recent form and the insidious people that he came into contact with anything might have happened, and I mean anything. He is known to have a violent temper; it is not inconceivable that he might have got himself into a disagreement with the wrong type of people and yes, as hard as I don’t want to say this but sure, he could be laying dead somewhere right now as I speak but until I have proof, some concrete clue that I can work with no, there isn’t anything I can do. I’m not a magician, Mrs. Lenning, I cannot make him or new evidence materialize out of thin air, so until something positive shows itself, I can’t do anything.” He moved another step closer and Gloria swallowed hard. “Do I make myself clear madam?”
She gave a weak nod of her head.
Fossick and Kember sat out in the car.
"With her breathing down his neck he's probably run away from her, the miserable old cow," said Kember.
"Could you blame him?”
Kember shook his head. “Nah, I guess not. Is she right though?”
“About what?” he asked back.
“Us, you know, not looking too hard for him.”
“Well look at it,” Fossick snapped back, “just consider the entire situation will ya. We’ve got a low-life loser, equally low-life friends and a chick that worked in a massage parlor, who’s also no longer in the picture. A mother with a rough appearance and mouth of a sewer, living out here in one of the crumbiest suburbs of Auckland, I mean really, what is the point. They’ve more than likely run off to the beach someplace, Tauranga for instance, and he’s probably banging the arse off of her as we speak. In a few days he’ll show back up, she’ll be sore as hell between her legs and everything will be fine. I tell ya it’ll be a waste of our time to put in the effort.” He stopped and lit a cigarette. “It’s all bollocks if you ask me. Come on, let’s get out of here." Fossick sucked hard on his cigarette. “What we need is a juicy murder. Now if he was discovered floating in the Hauraki Gulf, face down with the heel of a stiletto shoe in the back of his head, now that would be worth pursuing.”
Kember grinned as he put the vehicle into gear and moved off.