Boca Daze Read online

You gave it to a slightly demented person. She won’t remember.

  Maybe not, but I will.

  I walked across the deserted parking lot to the side stairwell and played the light on the stairs. I saw nothing unusual, but I detected the smell of chemicals. I closed my eyes and mouth and inhaled through my nose. It smelled like a swimming pool or a hospital corridor.

  Chlorine. Stain remover.

  I took a bottle of premixed Luminol from my crime kit. Luminol is used to detect blood stains after a surface has been cleaned. Next, I removed the long-exposure Canon Mark II camera I used for night photography. I sprayed the top three stairs with Luminol and waited for the chemiluminescence … the striking blue glow that appears when the chemical reacts to the iron in hemoglobin.

  Nothing!

  I sprayed the next three steps and was disappointed again.

  Why clean up with bleach if you had nothing to hide?

  The ninth step lit up like a glow stick. I fumbled for my camera and snapped two long-exposure pictures. I sprayed again, and the last three steps turned bright blue and the adjacent walls glowed. That meant blood splatter. Weary Willie had been here and bled all over the place.

  I struggled up the stairs on old, creaky knees and hobbled to my Mini. I was halfway out of the lot when I remembered Bailey’s last words.

  I remembered the clattering sound I heard after Bailey stopped screaming.

  I could call her sister if I had her cell phone.

  My tires squealed as I made a U-turn and raced back to the trash bin. I stood on the hood of the Mini and shone my flashlight into the Dumpster. It was empty … except for the cell phone on the bottom.

  Bailey, you genius.

  I pulled into the parking lot of the Embassy Suites on Yamato just west of the I-95 overpass and opened Bailey’s phone. Her speed dial contained three sets of initials: BK, BRPD, and MS. Trying to think like Bailey, I figured BK was for the Boca Knight, BRPD signified Boca Raton Police Department, and MS was My Sister.

  I pressed the MS button, and a woman’s voice answered. “Bailey, is everything all right?”

  “This isn’t Bailey,” I said calmly, trying not to alarm her. “It’s a friend.”

  “Are you a homeless person, too?”

  “No. My name is Eddie Perlmutter.”

  “I never heard of you. What are you doing with Bailey’s phone?”

  “It’s a long story. Can we meet?”

  “No. I don’t know you.”

  “Bailey wants me to give you a message.”

  “You can give it to me over the phone.” Her voice sounded unsteady … like Bailey’s.

  “She’s going to the baker. Does that mean anything to you?”

  “Oh, God.” She hung up.

  I redialed. No answer.

  For the last time, Eddie, call the cops.

  I gave my word.

  You’re a schmuck.

  Yes, but an honorable one.

  I got off the phone with Bailey’s sister and realized I hadn’t asked her name or address.

  That would never have happened a few years ago. Damn.

  I drove home wishing Bailey’s phone would ring. I went to bed disappointed.

  The next morning, Claudette and I had breakfast on the balcony of my San Remo apartment overlooking a narrow, manmade canal and the sixth hole of the neighboring Boca Heights golf course. I brought her up-to-date with my cases. She asked me concise, intelligent questions about Bailey, her sister, Yankee caps, St. Mary’s money, Doc Hurwitz, and Lou’s computer courage. I gave her rambling, inconclusive answers and ended with a question of my own.

  “Do you think the girl at CVS knows the Viagra’s for me?”

  “That’s what you’re thinking about?”

  “I can’t control every thought,” I said, defending myself.

  “There’s no fool like an old fool,” she said with a sigh and took a sip of coffee.

  I gazed across the thin strip of water at the golf course. Two golf carts and four golfers were about forty yards away from my balcony on an elevated tee. Two women were in one cart and two men in the other. The women talked to each other while the men stretched and took smooth, rhythmic practice swings. A tall, slim man dressed in pink teed up a ball. He took two perfect, rhythmic practice swings, assumed a professional hitting stance, and stood motionless just long enough for an evil spirit to inhabit his body. His actual swing was a lightning-fast blur of iron and wood, striking the ball and producing a sound similar to that of a stick hitting a rock.

  The ball screeched over his left foot, bounced wildly down the side of the hill, and splashed into the water. Something live and scaly scrambled from the underbrush and slithered into the canal.

  “Shit,” the pink man cursed, then pounded his clubhead into the ground and shouted, “Mulligan,” before repeating the entire process. The results were identical.

  “I suck,” he cursed and sulked to his cart.

  Claudette leaned toward me. “I understand shit and I suck … but what’s a mulligan?”

  “A magic word.”

  “Like abracadabra?”

  “Sort of … but it only works on a golf course.”

  “What does it do?”

  “It makes bad shots disappear and gives you a do-over.”

  “Isn’t that cheating?”

  “Not in golf,” I said. “If the other three players with you agree that your bad shot didn’t happen, it didn’t happen … and you get to do it again.”

  “What if they don’t agree?”

  “You have to live with your mistake.”

  “Like real life,” she said.

  I nodded.

  We watched foursomes come and go and listened to them.

  “Elephant’s ass,” one man shouted after he hit.

  “What’s an elephant’s ass?” Claudette asked.

  “It’s high, and it stinks,” I told her.

  She put her fingertips to her lips and giggled. “Golfers are so hard on themselves.”

  “Self-loathing is part of the game. Listen.”

  The words floated across the canal on a breeze. Idiot, Imbecile, Stupid, I can’t believe it, I always do that, I never do that, I sliced it, I hooked it, I skulled it, I shanked it, I smothered it, I dubbed it, I picked up, I hit down, I hit it thin, I hit it fat, I quit at the bottom, I came over the top, I suck, This game sucks, I hate this game.

  “They sound so unhappy,” she said sympathetically. “Why do they play?”

  “Some people do self-mutilation … some play golf.”

  My cell phone rang, and I said hello to Lou Dewey, who brought me up-to-date on his B.I.G. research. “I’m almost ready to go public,” he said. “I’ve narrowed down my explanation to a single question.”

  “Good. Just don’t do anything without talking to me first, Lou,” I told him.

  He didn’t make any promises before he disconnected.

  I put down the phone. “I really concerned that Lou is going to screw this up.”

  “Do you think he’s right that Grover is a fraud?”

  “I don’t know what to think. How could one man manipulate so many people for so long?”

  “In Haiti they use voodoo,” she said.

  “Pins, dolls, and chicken heads?”

  “Mind control,” she clarified. “Bokos in Haiti can turn normal people into mindless zombies.”

  “Bokos?”

  “Witch doctors.”

  “You think Grover’s a witch doctor?”

  “If people follow him mindlessly … yes,” she said emphatically.

  “A Wall Street witch doctor,” I said, laughing.

  “Bokos are not funny,” she said seriously. “They can destroy a person’s mind.”

  “I’m sorry. But I can’t picture Grover dressed as a witch doctor. He wears $2,000 suits to work every day.”

  “If he has the power to control people’s minds, he is nothing more than a well-dressed boko.”

  “Voodoo doesn
’t exist on Wall Street,” I told her.

  “You must be kidding.”

  “Let me rephrase that. There are no zombies on Wall Street.”

  “Ed-eee,” she whined as if she were talking to a slow learner.

  “Okay, maybe Wall Street has black magic and mumbo jumbo,” I conceded, “but that doesn’t make Grover a boko.”

  “If he makes zombies, he is a boko.”

  “How do you make a zombie, anyway?”

  “By paralyzing a victim using poison from a puffer fish,” she said cryptically.

  “Or in Grover’s case … shit from a bull,” I said, going with the flow.

  “Yes.” She smiled. “The victim is paralyzed and mesmerized by the venom, but still fully awake. The poison eventually causes neurological damage resulting in the loss of the victim’s ability to reason. The boko then fills the victim’s head with crazy ideas and superstitions. Lastly, the poor soul is buried alive in a shallow grave with just enough air to last one night. The next day, shortly before death, the victim is uncovered. From the grave emerges a sensory-deprived, dehydrated, brain-damaged zombie.”

  “Conditioned to believe whatever the boko says,” I completed her sentence.

  “Exactly.” She patted my knee like a proud teacher. “The boko creates zombies and rules them by fear.”

  “Grover doesn’t use fear,” I said, pointing out a discrepancy.

  “Yes, he does. He uses the fear of being left out of something too good to be true. Everyone has different fears.”

  Benjamin Israel Grover … a boko … mesmerizing people by burying them under a pile of bullshit and not letting them up for air until they’ve lost their humanity and sense of reality?

  Why not?

  To find Bailey I had to learn the habits and haunts of Boca’s homeless. I knew where Bailey slept but not where she lived. I asked Chief Burke for help. He assigned me to his information officer, Sergeant Iris Adler, for a briefing, and Officer Rosalind Dowd for a tour. I met Sergeant Adler in her office at police headquarters. She was thin and fit and looked young enough to be my daughter.

  “What can I tell you, Mr. Perlmutter?” she asked.

  “What’s the police policy toward the homeless in Boca?”

  “We use the Pottinger decision of 1988. Are you familiar with that?”

  I said I wasn’t.

  “In 1988 a class-action suit was filed against the City of Miami on behalf of the homeless. A man named Michael Pottinger was one of the plaintiffs. The suit claimed the city routinely harassed homeless people, destroyed their property, and violated their constitutional rights. After a lengthy trial, the homeless won.”

  “Who said you can’t fight city hall?” I quipped. “What was the judgment?”

  “The city was ordered to change police procedures. Contracts were written, and thorough record keeping was ordered. An advisory committee was formed to enforce compliance.”

  “Was there a monetary award?”

  “Six hundred thousand dollars … about $1,500 per plaintiff. But the suit was about change, not money.”

  “Did things change?”

  “Absolutely,” she said. “The biggest change was police can no longer arrest the homeless for performing life-sustaining bodily functions in public.”

  “Do you have to make a lot of judgment calls?”

  “Someone always pushes the envelope. We try to enforce the law sensibly.”

  I heard a knock on the open door and turned to see another policewoman young enough to be my daughter.

  “Officer Rosalind Dowd,” Adler said, “meet Mr. Eddie Perlmutter.”

  Dowd’s handshake was firm. “The Boca Knight. It’s a pleasure. Are you ready for a tour of the back roads of Boca?”

  “Ready.”

  As promised, Officer Dowd drove to areas in Boca seldom seen. We started in Pearl City, located west of Federal Highway, near upscale Mizner Park.

  “Pearl City is Boca’s oldest black community,” she said, pointing at small, faded houses. “It was originally built in 1915 for black laborers working on the construction of the Boca Resort. This part of Pearl City was declared a historical district just a few years ago.”

  She stopped by a huge tree with enormous protruding roots. “This banyan is called the Tree of Knowledge. Generations of people in Pearl City sat in its shade and learned. It was so revered that when Glades Road was widened, they diverted the street around the tree to save it.”

  She showed me a modest memorial bust of Martin Luther King, isolated and alone at the end of a nondescript street.

  We exited the neighborhood and drove north on Dixie, crossing Glades. “Dixie Manor is part of Pearl City, too.” She pointed at rows of one-and two-level apartment buildings. “Originally it was built as army barracks during World War II and was acquired by the Housing Authority in 1978. They were rehabbed into Section Eight housing after that, along with Lincoln Center, just north of Glades.”

  She waved to a couple of black kids on bicycles. They waved back.

  “How’s the relationship between police and residents here?”

  “The historical district is peaceful. Generations of black families have been living there for years. Dixie Manor and Lincoln Center are more transient, and drugs are the main problem there.”

  “Why is it called Pearl City?”

  “I think Hawaiian pearl pineapples were farmed years ago.”

  We made more twists and turns, and Officer Dowd continued pointing out places of interest.

  “The Friendship Missionary Baptist Church over there has a soup kitchen run by Boca Helping Hands, a charitable organization. A lot of homeless eat free.”

  Three Bag Bailey told me.

  “Who qualifies for a free meal?” I asked.

  “Everyone who wants one. Helping Hands wants to teach poor people to be self-sufficient, but we they have to feed them before we can teach them.”

  I checked my watch. It was nearly 11:00 a.m. “Can we take a look?”

  “Sure.” She parked near the church.

  Several people, black and white … poor and homeless … were gathered outside the church. Some looked worn and forlorn. Some looked feral. Some smiled at Officer Dowd; some didn’t. Everyone looked at me curiously, trying to decide if I was there to help or to eat.

  The dining area was a small, rectangular room crammed with packages and people. Paper bags of groceries were lined up like soldiers on two long wooden tables that ran the length of the dining area. Each bag had a name attached.

  On the other side of the room were three rows of tables with enough chairs to seat about thirty people. The kitchen area was bustling with enthusiastic helpers who seemed to be delighted to be there.

  Officer Dowd introduced me to a bulky, middle-aged woman wearing a stained apron. Her hair was short and frizzy, and I noticed a pencil stuck behind her right ear. She smiled when she heard my name, shook my hand, and patted my back. “Welcome.”

  “Thank you,” I said, looking around. “This is a busy place.”

  “Last year we served over 5,000 meals in this place and delivered over 7,000 more to homes,” she told me proudly.

  “I’m impressed.”

  “Thanks,” she said enthusiastically and called out to her fellow workers. “Hey, everyone, we’ve got a visitor. It’s the Boca Knight, Eddie Perlmutter, and he’s impressed by what we do.”

  People stopped working and actually applauded, making me feel guilty for not being as enthusiastic as they were. Greetings were shouted at me from around the room, and I waved self-consciously.

  I was introduced to the head chef, who gave me a bear hug. “How you been, Eddie? Long time no see.”

  He looked familiar, but nothing clicked.

  “Harold Trager,” he said. “Coolidge Corner … Brookline. My father, Al, owned a deli there.”

  “Harold, I thought you looked familiar,” I said.

  “I should. I used to throw you out of my father’s deli all the time.”


  “You look great, Harold. I didn’t recognize you. You’re so thin now.”

  “Are you saying I was fat?” he said, laughing.

  “No. You had big bones.”

  “Elephants have big bones. But thanks anyway.”

  “It’s good to see you,” I told him. “By the way, why did you throw me out of your father’s deli all the time?”

  “You and your Golden Gloves buddies used to hang out at a table and order nothing but cream sodas. We needed the table for real customers. Everyone else in the deli was afraid of you, so my father told me to throw you out.”

  “You weren’t afraid of me?”

  “I was scared shitless of you, but my father scared me more.”

  “What’s for lunch today, Harold?”

  “Osso buco,” he said proudly. “It’s my specialty.”

  “So I’ve been told.”

  We stayed through lunch but didn’t eat. Officer Dowd mingled easily with the people while I kept out of the way and watched. Despite the crowded conditions, there was no pushing or shoving. I noticed a long line of filled paper bags marked “hygiene kits” under the tables. I looked inside a bag and saw toothpaste, soap, shampoo, toilet paper, dental floss, Q-tips, and several miscellaneous personal items. The kits were marked with names, and I watched as each bag was claimed and carried away. When the room was empty, except for the volunteers, I checked my watch. It took about an hour to feed over thirty people and provide home supplies to many more. It reminded me of Thanksgiving: hours of preparation for a meal that ended in minutes.

  I saw two unclaimed bags and mentioned it to Officer Dowd. She checked the name and said someone who looked out of place would show up for them. When the room was nearly empty, a neatly dressed, middle-aged man entered and signed for his bags. He was about to pick them up when he recognized me. He looked uncomfortable.

  “You’re the Boca Knight, aren’t you?” he asked, walking toward me.

  I nodded and extended my hand. “Eddie Perlmutter,” I said with a friendly smile.

  “Lincoln Tucker,” he said, shaking my hand. “I was at your rally years ago.”

  “That makes you a Boca Knight, too.”

  “I don’t feel like one. I never thought I’d be in this position.”

  “You don’t have to explain yourself to me,” I said.