As a preparation for my Crime Novel (Osnabrück Hafen) I have written several crime stories to learn the tricks. 

Here is an early one:

Biloxi Gambling Blues

„Have a look at this, while I’m gone.” Bill pushed a manila envelope across the table and got up, the case under his arm.

He was two steps away from the door to the restrooms, when the first bullet hit him in the shoulder. It turned his face back to where Al sat, the envelope still unopened in his hands.

Al saw the second firing of the gun. A man stood against the sun lit entrance to the diner and shot Bill in the face. Bill collapsed. Al pushed the envelope under the menu, while the killer walked over to Bill’s body. Another man was covering him from the door. The killer took the case Bill had carried with him to the restroom, and came back to where Al was sitting, both hands on the table. He stared into Al’s eyes for a moment, the gun still vaguely pointing at him. Then he passed and walked back to the door.

Then the two men entered a blue sedan. A third man drove them South on Iberville Drive. Everything had taken less than two minutes.

When the police and an ambulance arrived ten minutes later they closed off the diner and started questioning the three customers and the bar man. One customer was under shock. The cook had taken flight after the first shot. The police asked Al to come with them to the station on Covenant Square Dr. as he was the only one who had talked to Bill.

There he told them everything he knew. How he had met Bill for the first time in the diner; that he did not know his last name; that Bill was from New Orleans, and that he had come to Biloxi only hours ago by car. It should be parked right outside the diner. Also he had carried a black attaché case under his arm. They had talked about Katrina and what it had done to Biloxi. He had shown him a few pictures of New Orleans, shot on the day of the hurricane. Al was too terrified to give a close description of the killer, except his eyes.

Al told them everything except about the manila envelope he carried inside his jacket. The officer took down his statement and his home address and workplace and let him go. 

Al drove home to his apartment on Croesus St., locked the door, and opened the envelope. He studied the content carefully for several minutes, before he switched on the TV to watch a re-run of Biloxi Blues. The phone rang twice, but he did not bother to answer it. 

There was nothing about the murder on the late night news. He made one phone call and then went to bed.

Next morning at seven Al drove over to his newsstand on Beach Drive. Ozzie was already shelving the newspapers. The killing of Bill had made the headlines of the Sun Herald and also in New Orleans. Al helped to put the newspapers on the rack before he settled down behind the counter. The first customers stopped by to pick up a paper or to buy cigarettes. Some talked to Ozzie while Al was studying the reports. 

The story did name Albert B. as the main witness, but contained more than Al knew. From the driver’s license and the bag in the car, the police had learned that William Mussel, 38 years old, was a member of the New Orleans mob, a low ranking soldier in one of the Dixie families with a long record of violence. He probably had a contract on someone in Biloxi. The bag in his car contained a semi-automatic gun. The killing in Joe’s Diner had signs of a gangland “execution.” But, the Sun Herald concluded, Biloxi had no crime scene, so the killers in the blue sedan must have come from the outside. The police gave a detailed description of the car and asked for reports from anyone who had seen his car on Tuesday afternoon.

Al put down the paper and opened the New Orleans Picayune. It added some details on W. Mussel and his crime record. It also hinted broadly at a powerful gambling racket linking Biloxi to New Orleans.

Customers came in more frequently now and Al had to attend to business. As word got around that he was the main witness, more and more customers dropped by, new and old, and Al had to repeat his story more than ten times. He took his lunch break after Ozzie came back.

When he reached home, he found the lock to his apartment broken and everything inside made a mess. The burglars had overturned every piece of furniture, scattering its contents on the floor. Al walked back to the hall way and opened his mailbox. He found a big white envelope promising new luxury flats on the Bahamas. Obviously, the burglars had not found what they had looked for. What better way to hide a purloined letter than in a mail box! Al put it back and returned to the apartment to call the police. Then he called Ozzie and told he would be late for work.

After work Al drove to Bessie’s apartment on Chapple James Av. The blinds in the high window were down, so she had customers. He settled down in his car in front of the apartment, and took out the envelope. Again, he studied it for almost two hours, closing his eyes now and then. The traffic was slow but steady.

The sun went down when the last customer left the house and the blinds went up again. Al waited another fifteen minutes before he rang the bell at E. Marlowe. A tepid breeze came in from the Gulf with a rotten smell.

Bessie let him in. Se had read the story about Bill, and she had already heard that Al was the principal witness. She fixed him a drink, while he told her about the burglary in his apartment, and how the police was suspecting a connection between the burglary and the killing. They had asked him about the face of the killer and other details, but all he could remember were the cold murderous eyes staring him down.

Then he told her about the envelope. That it was too risky to keep it in his apartment. Bessie had a little safe in her apartment, and she offered to keep it for him. Then she let down the blinds and invited him to stay overnight.

Afterwards, he fell asleep with his arm around her.

He left early to help Ozzie with the papers. There was nothing new on the killing, but the customers kept coming to talk about it. It was a long day and a lot of tedious work.

Al did not return home. He drew some cash at the Edgewater Mall and drove down Beach Blvd. taking turns to the left every two blocks, always driving east. On one of his turns he reached the bridge crossing the Bay heading north. He slowed down after the bridge, and carefully chose the first small road heading towards Saucier on 49.

It was almost 8 pm when he parked his car in Saucier between two fences sealing off two large industrial lots. He sat in the car for some time and let four or five cars pass by. Then he got out and walked around the lot on his left. Toward the end, he found an opening in the fence, patched up with some barbed wire, but easy to re-open. He stopped, looked around, then he crept in. This side of the lot was full of trees. Beneath them, in long rows, old German and Russian army trucks loomed, quietly rusting away. Al stopped, closing his eyes, and then started walking towards the fourth line of trucks to the left. He stopped again, looked around and sat down on the ground, right next to a green German truck with the number 49. It tilted to the other side, because its tires had given out. It was very quiet, a few rats moved through the leaves in the dusk.

Al got up. He tried the door on the opposite side of 49, waited, then opened it slowly, paused, then he crept it. The heat and the stench inside the truck were almost unbearable, but Al quietly took the driver’s seat, looking outside and scanning the long line of trucks. Then he carefully closed the door and opened the window. The sun was almost down, only the sound of the wind and some rats could be heard.

He began to explore the back of the truck. He found a cot, empty cans, soda bottles, and a dirty bucket. He carefully inspected the cot in the dusk, and the canvas next to it. He looked under the cot, and worked his way systematically back to the driver’s seat. He found nothing. It was almost dark before he left the truck. For another five minutes he sat down, closing his eyes, listening to the rats. The moonlight helped to reach the opening in the fence. 

His car was broken. Someone had smashed the windows on both sides, the trunk stood open. The radio and the tape deck were missing. The dark street lay pale and empty.

He pulled out his cell phone, paused, put it back again, and closed the trunk. He drove slowly, switching dark country roads all the way to Biloxi. Nobody was following him. He left the car near Esposito and walked to beach.

When he crossed Beach Blvd. a wino stopped him for a dollar in front of a liquor store. Al invited him to share a bottle of wine on the beach instead. They selected a cheap California red wine and walked together to the beach.

His name was Ryan, and he had open the bottle before they they found a place to sit down in the sand. The gulf lay quiet and only the stars gave little light. Al offered the plastic cups he had brought from the liquor store and they began drinking. Soon after Ryan left to buy another bottle with Al’s crumpled dollar bills. Ryan had seen better days. He had worked for the Air force at Keisler Base, before the alcohol had ended his career. Al told him he had worked for a casino before Katrina had wiped out dockland gambling. He now had franchised a news stand with a partner, but he kept on gambling now and then. Ryan had not heard about the killing. So Al told him all about it, and soon they were opening a third bottle of red wine.

Ryan slept in a derelict hotel on Delauney Str., partly destroyed by Katrina. Several homeless people slept there too. It was safe. 

“I am staying with a friend,” Al said. 

He pulled out his phone and called Bessie. A policeman answered, and he asked for Bessie.

“This is officer Brand, we are conducting an investigation, and I must ask you to tell me your name and address. – I warn you, we can trace your call.”

“I am Albert Bondaga, and a personal friend of Bessie.”

“Sir, we are glad you called. Your name was on a list we found with the victim. Miss Marlowe was shot in her apartment, and we are going through her belongings. You are on her customers list. When can you come down to headquarters?”

“Listen, you have my address already. But I cannot be with you before 10. I have a business to attend to.”

OK, give me your phone number and call Sgt. Riley at headquarters tomorrow at nine.”

Al did, hang up and told Ryan what he had just learned. Ryan, who seemed remarkably sober, invited him to stay at the hotel overnight.

“There are plenty of empty rooms since Katrina, and I know how to get you in.”

They bought another bottle and walked over to the Grand Regency. It looked kind of haunted under the wild palms. The remaining windows were nailed up. Ryan led him through a rabble of planks and boards which led them to a dark hallway connecting the few rooms left.

Ryan invited him to his room, and they shared the last two cups of wine in the dark room.

Suddenly, Al began to tell him about the envelope.

It had to do with the famous kidnapping case two months ago. A friend of his in New Orleans had told him he met someone who definitely knew something about the kid. The father was a very rich Chevron manager who had offered a large award for any information leading to the whereabouts of his five-year old son. So Al had contacted the father’s lawyer, a Mr. Benway, to offer some help to find the kid. It was kind of a wild stake.

He had no idea that the guy from New Orleans would be a gangster and that a gang war would follow from this. Ryan clucked sympathetically.

“Listen I know someone who works as an informer for the local police, and he could find out about the local mob. If they are involved, he could get you out of this trouble spot. Ritchie owes me, and you could talk to him tomorrow morning, before you go to see the police. Maybe, you should tell them about the envelope and Benway.”

Al closed his eyes.

“Ritchie has a room across he hallway. Actually, if you feel safer here, you can sleep on the cot over there. After so many bottles we are almost like buddies, aren’t we?”

Al opened his eyes. It wass too late, anyway. He threw himself over the cot and fell asleep almost immediately.

Ryan woke him up at 7.30. Some light was coming in from the boarded-up window. 

“Quick,” he said, “Ritchie is up and ready to see you. He has to leave early, around 8.00. He also knows Benway. This is your chance. I’ll get you a coffee while you are gone.”

Al threw some water from a bucket over his face, straightened his jacket he had slept in. The wallet with the money was still in its place.

He walked across the hallway towards number 27. He was two steps away from the door when he stopped in his track. He turned his face back to look down the pale, empty corridor. Then he opened the door.

Version 3: Monday, February 18, 2013