Detective

* * *

Prieto Fast Delivery and Porky's Trucking were similarly cooperative, and the four combined visits revealed other facets of Doil's character, including the fact that he disliked regular work. When he felt like working, probably because he needed money, he would phone one of the companies, and if work was available, he was taken on temporarily. He was obviously smart enough not to cheat or steal at any of those places, but he clearly could not control his turbulent, aggressive nature.

For Ruby Bowe, the next step was to compare the information with dates of the various killings.

Back at her desk at Homicide, Bowe dealt with the outof-Miami murders first. On March 12, Hal and Mabel Larsen were murdered in Clearwater, 260 miles northwest of Miami. On that same day, while working for Overland Trucking, Elroy Doil drove a tractor-trailer load of furniture from Miami to Clearwater, where, according to a driving log and expense record, he arrived during midafternoon and stayed overnight at the Home Away From Home Motel. Bowe, her excitement growing, phoned the motel and learned that it was four blocks from the address of the murder victims. Doil returned to Miami the following day with a load of coiled steel and plastic pipe.

Also, Doil had made a previous trip to Clearwater for Overland only two weeks before and had stayed at the same motel. The first trip, Bowe reasoned, could have allowed him to pinpoint his victims, the second to murder them.

Next were the Fort Lauderdale killings of Irving and Rachel Hennenfeld, reported on May 23, though it was estimated the victims had died four days earlier, on May 19.

During May, Doil had made two trips to Fort Lauderdale, this time for Porky's Trucking, the first on May 2, and again on the nineteenth. A log for the second date showed he had left Miami at 3:30 P.M., made three deliveries in Fort Lauderdale, and returned a few minutes before midnight. Since the distance between the two cities was only twenty-five miles, eight and a half hours seemed a long time to be away. However, the earlier trip, on May 2nd, which included four deliveries in Fort Lauderdale, had taken only five hours. Again Bowe reasoned that finding the right victims probably took less time than the gory business of slaying them.

While the three Miami serial killings did not have quite the same close connections, each one displayed linkages too apposite to be dismissed as coincidence.

During the morning that preceded the killings of Homer and Blanche Frost in the Royal Colonial Hotel, Doil had made eight deliveries and four pickups in Coral Gables while working for Prieto Fast Delivery. Two of the deliveries were to businesses on Southwest 27th Avenue, the same location as the First Union Bank branch where the Frosts had gone that same morning to cash eight hundred Dollars in traveler's checks.

It was entirely possible, Bowe thought indeed probable that Elroy Doil saw the elderly couple, perhaps even in the bank, and followed them back to their hotel. It would then be a simple matter to ride with the Frosts in an elevator to their floor and, while appearing to be just another hotel guest, note the number of their room, then return late that night. All conjecture, of course, but combined with the previous crimes and linkages, it was too credible to ignore.

Then there were the additional Miami killings of Lazaro and Luisa Urbina at Pine Terrace Condominiums, and of Commissioner Gustav Ernst and his wife, Eleanor, at Bay Point. In both cases the records for both Prieto Fast Delivery and Suarez Motors & Equipment showed that Doil made deliveries near the victims' homes.

The Prieto records copied by Detective Bowe noted two Doil deliveries close to the Urbinas' on separate days and within the three weeks preceding the Urbina murders. As for the walled-in, security-guarded Bay Point subdivision, Doil had made two small deliveries there for Suarez Motors not to the Ernsts, but to other houses. The last occasion was more than a month before the Ernst killings, but that, Bowe reminded herself, could be because Suarez employed Doil as a mechanic and only occasionally used him as a driver. The two trips he had made into Bay Point, however, would have familiarized him with the security setup and probably enabled him to talk his way in again with phony delivery papers.

Something else caught Bowe's attention. Her copy of the Suarez Motors paycheck that Elroy Doil had not collected indicated that he had abruptly quit work the day after the murders of Gustav and Eleanor Ernst.

Did Doil quit, Bowe wondered, because he thought he might be a suspect in the serial killings by now and therefore wanted to disappear?

* * *

At the end of her research and analysis, an eager Detective Bowe communicated what she had learned to Sergeant Ainslie. He was buoyed by her news and, while holding a few details back, passed along most of the information to the special task force members, telling them, "Doil's our guy, no doubt of h, so be patient and stay alert despite this lousy weather. Sooner or later he'll slip up and we'll be there to grab him."

Ainslie also kept the assistant state attorney, Curzon Knowles, informed. Knowles's reaction, though, was unenthusiastic.

"Sure, Ruby's been resourceful in getting all that stuff. And, yes, it tells us that Doil had the opportunity to knock off all those people and probably did. But proving it is something else, and among the whole schmeer there's not one scrap of solid evidence. You don't even have enough for an arrest warrant."

"I know that, counselor, but I simply wanted to keep you in the picture. There is a positive side, though. We're sure enough about Doil not to waste time on anyone else."

"Yes, I can see that."

"So we'll keep working at it," Ainslie said. "There'll be a break somewhere, soon. I truly believe it."

The attorney chuckled. "I perceive, Malcolm, that you are, after all, still in the faith business."

12

Along with the miserable weather accompanying the more than three-week surveillance of Elroy Doil, an intestinal flu epidemic swept through Miami. Many in the Police Department were affected, including two detectives from the special task force, Jose Garcia and Seth Wightman. Both men were sent home, with instructions to stay in bed, creating even more problems for the surveillance process.

As a result, Malcolm Ainslie and Dan Zagaki were now working a double shift. They had been on duty for nine hours; another fifteen lay ahead. It was 4:20 P.M. and they were parked in a Burdines Department Store delivery van on Northeast 35th Terrace, half a block from Elroy Doil's two-room wooden shack.

Again, it had been raining throughout most of the day. Now, accompanying the rain, the sky was darkening.

Earlier in the day, beginning at 7:00 A.M., Doil had driven an Overland Trucking tractor-trailer rig from Miami to West Palm Beach, then to Boca Raton, returning to Miami at 3:00 P.M. after an approximately 140-mile haul in difficult weather. A trio of surveillance teams, including Ainslie and Zagaki, had monitored Doil's journey. Apart from continuous rain, nothing out of the ordinary happened except for one observation Zagaki made during the drive: "There's something different about Doil today, Sergeant. Not sure what it is . . ."

"He's tense," Ainslie agreed. "You can see it in his driving, and every time he stops he seems restless, like he has to keep his body moving."

"Does it mean anything, Sergeant?" Ainslie shrugged. "Could be drugs, though he has no history of drugs. Maybe he's nervous. Only he knows why. "

"Maybe we'll find out."

"Maybe." Ainslie left it there, but was aware of his own tension, a familiar sense that events were somehow moving toward a climax.

Now, having followed Doil from Overland Trucking's Miami depot to his home, Ainslie and Zagaki were waiting for whatever happened next.

"Mind if I doze off for a while, Sergeant?" Zagaki asked.

"No. Go ahead." It made sense to take some rest if possible on a long double shift, particularly since Doil, after his eight-hour truck journey, was inside and probably sleeping.

"Thanks, Sergeant," Zagaki said as he leaned back and closed his eyes.

Ainslie, though, had no intention of sleeping. He was still not totally confident of the young detective, and the reason he had paired himself with Zagaki was to keep an eye on him throughout the surveillance. To be fair, though, Ainslie reminded himself, Zagaki's performance so far could not be faulted. He had done everything required of him, including long spells of driving. Just the same. . .

It was Zagaki's manner that made him uneasy, and while it was difficult to point to anything specific, Ainslie's finely honed instincts told him that Zagaki's studied respectfulness, which he overdid by saying "Sergeant" a few times too often, was wafer-thin and bordering on fawning.

Or was he himself, Ainslie wondered, being excessively critical?

"Thirteen hundred to thirteen-ten." The call came crisply through his portable police radio.

It was Lieutenant Leo Newbold.

Ainslie answered, "Thirteen-ten. QSK."

To help out during the task force personnel shortage, Newbold had filled in on several shifts, pairing with Dion Jacobo. The two served as backup to Ainslie and Zagaki, and were now positioned a few blocks away in an eightyear-old Ford sedan with dented fenders, peeling paint, and a supercharged engine that enabled it to keep up with anything on the road.

Newbold's voice came back, "Is anything happening?"

"Negative," Ainslie said. "Subject is " He stopped abruptly. "Hold on! He's just come out of the house, heading for his pickup." He reached over and shook Zagaki, who opened his eyes and sat up straight, then started the van's motor.

Outside, Doil lumbered across the yard, his hands pushed deep into the pockets of his jeans, his eyes downcast.

After a few moments Ainslie continued, "Subject now in pickup, pulling away, moving fast. We're following."

Doil's departure was unexpected. But Zagaki already had the Burdines delivery van in gear and was pulling out into the road, keeping the battered pickup truck in sight.

"We're rolling," Newbold responded. "Will be behind you. Advise direction of travel."

Ainslie transmitted, "Subject has reached North Miami Avenue, now turning south." And soon after, "He is crossing Twenty-ninth Street."

From Newbold: "We are on Second Avenue, parallel with you. Continue advising cross streets. Ready to cross and take over when you want."

Two surveillance vehicles traveling on parallel streets and switching periodically was a regular, though sometimes tricky, surveillance technique.

The rain was heavier now and the wind rising.

Newbold again: "This is your show, Malcolm. But do you think we should call in a third team?"

Ainslie answered, "Not yet. Don't believe he'll go out of town again . . . He is now crossing Eleventh Street; we are a block behind. Let's switch at Flagler."

"QSL."

Ainslie again: "Approaching Flagler Street. Subject continuing south. You take him, Lieutenant. We'll drop off."

Newbold: "We are on Flagler facing west, making a left turn onto South Miami Avenue . . . Yes, we see him. He's behind us . . . has now passed us . . . two vehicles between us; we'll keep it that way." A few minutes later: "Subject crossing Tamiami Trail, seems to know where he's going, probably west. Suggest we switch again at Bayshore. "

"QSL. Closing on you now."

Thus it happened that Ainslie and Zagaki were in the lead car when Elroy Doil's pickup truck, after driving briefly west on the heavily traveled Bayshore Drive, slowed near Mercy Hospital, then turned right into the wealthy residential area of Bay Heights.