I WHIPPED THE car in a tight turn off Atlantic to westbound Rosecrans, then made a quick left onto White Avenue.
Large old houses sat quiet and dark, houses left over from a time when East Compton was all white and affluent. Now the houses came retrofitted with bars on the windows and doors, making them nocturnal caves to wait out the evil that walked the night.
Graffiti marked every available wall with gang monikers declaring territory not to be violated by rivals. Monikers like Spooky, Lil’ Gun, Big Mac, Junior, and K-dog. The roll call went on and on, interspersed with “RIP” next to some to indicate the members who’d given the ultimate sacrifice for their hood. What an absolute senseless way of life.
I didn’t have to tell Sonja. She picked up the mic and said, “Two-Fifty-Five is ten-ninety-seven, tag one-zero-one, Two-Five-Five.”
We were about to go on-scene.
Dispatch came back with “Ten four, all Lynwood units limit your air traffic, Two-Fifty-Five is ninety-seven on a two-eleven with a man down.”
I shoved it in park and got out. “Watch your back and don’t forget to look up.”
Out on dangerous scenes, cops are notorious for tunnel vision. They do a good job watching what comes right in front, but in the heat of the moment, they tend to forget their flank and hardly ever look up. It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen. Crooks sometimes double back. They come in from behind or climb a tree or lie low on a roof or overhang in a perfect position to ambush.
Sonja drew her service revolver and said, “Roger that.”
We moved up the sidewalk toward the house. I whispered, “Don’t turn your flashlight on until you have to, then hold it away from your body.”
“Bruno, take it easy. I got this.”
I nodded in the dark. She couldn’t see me nod; her focus remained on what lay ahead, her eyes wider than normal, taking it all in.
The old three-foot chain-link gate hung open and crooked. Even in the moonless night the discoloration from all the rust stood out. Shrubs and trees grew out of control and obscured the windows and front door to 16637 White Avenue.
I took the lead and we passed through the fence. The black wrought-iron security gate at the front door also hung open. Behind the gate the thick door stood ajar. A subdued yellow light sliced into the darkness angled away from us. Splotches of fresh blood marred the waxed tile porch. I pointed to it. Sonja nodded.
I stopped at the entrance, peered in, and yelled, “Sheriff’s department.”
No answer.
“Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. We’re comin’ in.” I moved up closer and eased the front door open the rest of the way. In the living room, a frail, elderly gentleman sat on an ottoman covered in an antimacassar from the divan. He held a bunch of wadded-up paper towels to his head. They’d turned red, saturated with blood.
“Where are they? How many were there?” Sonja asked as she moved past the old man, following her extended gun to check out the rest of the house.
“They’re gone. They ran out that way.” His voice was feeble. He took his bloodied hand with the towels from his head and pointed to the front door.
Sonja checked anyway. She turned on her flashlight and disappeared down the hallway, her shadow tall and dancing.
I put my hand on the old man’s leg, which was covered in thick cotton pajamas. “What happened?”
“I’m a fool, a doddering old fool. That’s what happened, Deputy.”
I said nothing and waited for him.
“I knew better, I did,” he said.
“In here. Bruno, there’s an old woman in here. She’s okay.”
Low murmurs came from the bedroom as Sonja spoke with the old woman.
The old man got up, his legs shaking, and headed toward Sonja’s voice. “That’s my wife. We’ve been married for fifty-five years,” he said over his shoulder as I followed him.
“Wait, you shouldn’t move around. Paramedics are on the way.” I caught up, took him by the arm, and fought down my reaction. His arm had hardly any muscle at all, just bone.
“I’ve always protected her. Always. Until tonight. Tonight I let her down. I let those ugly people into our house. And I let my wife down. I jeopardized her safety.”
The man looked to be in his mid- to late-eighties and was decrepit with age. His hair was snow-white, now matted with wet red. With his slumped shoulders and no ass, I don’t know how his pajamas stayed up. He couldn’t defend his wife against any kind of threat. Maybe if he had a cast-iron frying pan he could defend against a charging mouse. But then he wouldn’t have the strength to lift the frying pan and wield it with any effectiveness.
The carpet under our feet looked Asian, a long runner over a polished hardwood floor. At one time this old white man and woman lived an affluent life in an all-white Compton that had turned bad on them. Their problem: they’d lived too long. They outlived their savings and had been forced to stay in the same house in the same neighborhood as it deteriorated all around them. The criminal element moved in, the gangs. I’d seen it far too often.
In the bedroom Sonja stood over by the nightstand, the phone to her ear. “Have paramedics roll in, it’s Code-Four here, suspects fled the scene. More to follow on the broadcast.”
On the street out front, the patrol unit’s PA blared out into the neighborhood and repeated some of her disposition of the call. “Two-Fifty-Three, Two-Five-Five is Code-Four, shut down your Code-Three and continue for an area check. Broadcast of suspects to follow.”
The man’s wife lay in bed with the covers pulled up to her nose, her eyes clouded with cataracts. Her overly wrinkled skin made her face sag, hound-dog style, her wispy white hair in disarray. “Maury,” she said, “it’s not your fault. Quit talkin’ like it’s your fault.”
This man and woman had no business living alone in the ghetto. They needed to be in an assisted-care home. I eased him down to a sitting position at the foot of the bed. Something out of the ordinary caught my attention. I raised my head and sniffed the air. The house smelled of old age, that hint of sour and dust combined with musty clothes and mothballs. But something else layered in with it that I couldn’t quite place, and it niggled at my brain.
The old man patted the bed. “Sit. Sit.”
I got down on one knee. “Please tell me what happened. What did they look like? Which way did they run? What were they armed with?”
We’d been in the house for about three minutes and needed to get out the broadcast update.
“Sit, sit.” He patted the bed again.
I sat down next to him. I got a closer look at his injury when he took his hand away. He’d been whacked with a long and slim and heavy weapon that had torn his paper-thin skin. The wound sagged open with an ugly goose egg underneath. When he’d pulled away the wad of paper towels, a rivulet of blood ran down next to his eye, filling the wrinkles and branching out like a river delta to meet up again and roll down to his chin, where it dripped in fat droplets on his pajama leg.
The unit PA outside blared again. “Two-Fifty-Five, shots fired, man down, 14367 Rose Avenue cross of White, tag one-zero-two, handle Code-Three.”
Sonja started to move on past us and hesitated, not knowing what to do, conflicted with going to the call or staying to help the old couple. She chose correctly to respond to the call. She picked up the old man’s hand and said, “Listen, we have to go, but we’ll be right back, I promise you we’ll be back. The paramedics will be here in just a minute.”
“No, please, don’t go. Please.”
She looked at me, expecting me to say it was okay, we could stay. I shook my head.
She said to the old man, “Sorry, we have to go.”